21/3/2022 1 Comment The 3rd Sundays in MarchSunday 20th March 2022. I find myself in a ‘lockdown’ situation as I have been self-isolating because I have Covid. It finally caught me. For two years I have managed to avoid it. I have now spent 5 days in isolation and will spend a few more as my test today is positive. This date has become significant in my life the past few years. This day last year (2021) rats ate their way into the place I was staying during the lockdown and I had to run out of that place and go and stay with friends. Thankfully I was able to stay with them in my ‘happy place’, Murlough House, Dundrum until I found other accommodation. The following days I had to pack up everything and clear out of that location as the rats had moved in! Exactly two years ago today (2020) I was sitting in my apartment in Nairobi, Kenya. It was the first Sunday of lockdown in Kenya. Churches had closed. Life had suddenly changed. I was happily sitting on my little balcony streamlining the church services from my church in Nairobi and also my home church in Belfast. I didn’t realise that within a few hours my life would change! It did. By 7pm that night I was in an Uber on my way to Nairobi airport to travel home to Belfast, N.Ireland. I had had only three hours to pack my cases and walk out the door. As I did, I remember I did wonder if I would return, because I remembered the experiences of missionary colleagues in the past in other countries and their escapes, although mainly due to civil wars not a virus! The Corona Virus began to cause our world to go into ‘lockdown’. Airports were closing all over the world. In fact, Kenyan airspace closed within hours of me leaving. None of us knew what was ahead – months of lockdown, followed by opening up and then further lockdowns, vaccination programmes and the deaths of thousands of people. Through it all my idea was to return to my ‘home’ in Nairobi, my life, my ministry my place of calling to train Kenyans for cross cultural mission. I had another eight years at least to fulfil that invitation to serve with Nairobi Chapel and their vision for planting churches around the world. I never settled during the following months as I was always looking to see when I could return to Kenya. I served with the church remotely. I lived out of my suitcases for the next fourteen months. I moved around as temporary accommodation became available. In February 2020 I decided to wait and get the double vaccine and then return to Kenya. I was aiming to return in July 2021. In late May I received the news that the role I had been invited to serve in with Nairobi Chapel was no longer viable due to the impact of Covid on the churches. This news was devastating for me. I didn’t see it coming. It sent me in a spin as all that I knew that was my life as I knew it was taken away with that news. What would I do now? Where would I live? Where would I serve? How would I survive financially? Was my missionary career over? It seemed like every aspect of my life became uncertain. Nothing was clear! Even the accommodation I was staying in at that time was temporary and only available for a few more weeks. The following hours, days and weeks and even months were scary. The reality of facing the uncertainty of all those aspects of my life at once were difficult to deal with. Normally you may face uncertainty in one or two aspects of your life at once but face all of them? That was unusual. What do you do when life turns into a raging storm within your heart and soul as well as your circumstances? You lean on what you know to be true and secure. For me that was God. I had proved during my life that God had been faithful to me from the day I stepped out in faith to go to Belfast Bible College. He had never failed me once. Sometimes music helps better than reading and I replayed the song ‘The Goodness of God’ by Cece Winans over and over on my iPod in bed with the tears running down my face. The words of that song were so true but I had to grasp them for dear life: And all my life You have been faithful And all my life You have been so, so good With every breath that I am able Oh, I will sing of the goodness of God I love Your voice You have led me through the fire In the darkest night You are close like no other I've known You as a Father I've known You as a Friend And I have lived in the goodness of God I couldn’t understand what was happening to me and I certainly had no idea why it was happening to me. I did grasp the fact Covid had impacted the situation but it all seemed bigger than just the impact of Covid. I had no idea what God might be doing in my situation and life. Another truth I knew was an anchor for my soul: the fact that God is sovereign and sovereign over me and my life. Again, it is another song that ministered to my soul, “Sovereign Over Us” by Michael W Smith. I also played it on repeat on my iPod with the tears running down my face and let the truth of those words sink in to my broken heart. There is strength within the sorrow There is beauty in our tears And you meet us in our mourning With a love that cast out fear You are working in our waiting You're sanctifying us When beyond our understanding You're teaching us to trust Your plans are still to prosper You have not forgotten us You're with us in the fire and the flood You're faithful forever Perfect in love You are sovereign over us The Psalms have always ministered to me in times of difficulty. These expressed for me my inexpressible thoughts and feelings and again they were a source of help to me. The words of Psalms such as Psalm 107:6 “Then they cried out to the Lord in their trouble, and he delivered them from their distress.” The words of Psalm 23 have also been a constant comfort. Nature and creation were another source of help and comfort and blessing even though many times I was outside experiencing and engaging in it with tears in my eyes. God uses His amazing creation to bless our souls. How can you not be unmoved by the beauty and power of a sunrise or a sunset? He knows how to reach out souls. Then there is the daily grind and routine that helps. Getting up at the same time, guarding time with the Lord and his word. Meal times at a regular time. Rest, exercise even if it’s a daily walk. All these daily events help us walk through the pain and hurt and loss that life can bring into our lives. Family and friends are key people to share with, confide in and even cry with. Find friends who can be trusted before difficulties arise. It’s too late to look for them when things go wrong. Church and the church family proved vital for me. Life was not ‘normal’ with the impact of Covid and restrictions affecting who and how families could meet but church was another dimension that for me gave stability and safety during the storm. I thank God for my church. I love my church. If anything was a blessing during the season of the storm and feeling ship wrecked, it was the love and care of the church leadership, missions’ team and congregation that helped navigate my life towards a safe harbour. New relationships have opened up, others have deepened. My life is all the richer because of having allowed my church to help me, comfort me, pray for me, minister to me and listen to me. Be honest. Don’t hide how you feel. I didn’t. I told people I was devastated because that’s how I felt. Take whatever opportunities for service that may open before you even if it’s not what you would choose. I did and it has proved to be a blessing. I started to serve on the church’s welcome team when the church reopened after the first lockdown. I am still serving on it. Other opportunities opened up. Serving in a conference centre, making beds, washing bedding, serving tables, washing dishes, helping in the kitchen were all hard work but fun and a blessing. Managing a community café for my church and leading the team of 40+ volunteers was never in my vision but I do it and guess what? I enjoy it. It’s also temporary but I am thankful to be trusted with different ministries. It’s now two years since I left Kenya. It’s now ten months since I received the news about my ministry in Kenya. I can testify that God has continued to be faithful throughout. He has provided for me and allowed me a little stability and a place to stay. My future is still uncertain. So far nothing is settled or confirmed. But today marks the start of Spring. The season of freshness and new life, longer days, more light, warmer days and the beauty of creation of little lambs and daffodils and the beauty of other spring flowers. There is also a Spring experience in my heart and soul. This incoming week I will have meetings and interviews with organisations that may lead me into my future. There has been a process during the dark days of winter in my soul. I have had to reconsider where I make my home. It has taken me months to accept that ‘home’ may be N.Ireland for now. Other new doors I could not have imagined have opened for me. I serve as a volunteer chaplain in a local hospital and in a local hospice. I love it, despite the challenges faced at each bedside. They are both new worlds I could never have imagined I would serve in two years ago, or ten months ago. I can now say that God is doing a new thing, well a number of new things in my life. “See, I am doing a new thing! Now it springs up; do you not perceive it? I am making a way in the wilderness and streams in the wasteland.” Isaiah 43: 19 God always promised me He would make ‘a path’ for me. He is proving to be guiding me along ‘unfamiliar paths’ and now I am okay with that. “I will lead the blind by ways they have not known, along unfamiliar paths I will guide them; I will turn the darkness into light before them and make the rough places smooth. These are the things I will do; I will not forsake them.” Isaiah 42: 16 I believe He is doing this. It is taking longer than I would have liked but He is doing it. He never fails.
I continue to trust the One who is Sovereign over me, my life and our world. He helps me live with uncertainty. I still don’t know where I will eventually live and settle. Or how that will all work out but He helps me trust Him to work it all out in His time. I don’t know what the 3rd Sunday in March 2023 will hold for me but I hope it isn’t something difficult but rather a ‘normal’ Sunday without shocks or surprises but even if it is, I know I can trust the One who will allow them enter my life to face them and to help me through whatever they may be. By Laura Sanlon
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17/2/2021 1 Comment The Day That Changed My Life
We were living through ‘The Troubles’ at that time and actually life was anything but fun and happy. Murders, bombings, tension and fear were all a part of daily life. Looking back, it is strange but life within ‘your world’ could also was fun and happy. I relate that to the paradox I have witnessed of children I have seen living in extreme poverty in India or Africa and yet they are happy ‘in their world’, playing in the mud and dirt unaware of their state, as compared to others in our world. I guess as a young person there was an excitement about life and the future despite the circumstances we were living in. Turning 21 had brought such joy and fun and happiness to me. It was an opportunity to celebrate in a big way and I did. I organised a party at a hotel and had fun planning it and inviting friends. Memories of that day are so vivid. Eddie called at my house that day. While I was preparing sandwiches for the party, we chatted. We were so excited about celebrating our 21st birthdays. I remember saying ‘here we are on the top of the hill, looking out on all of life ahead of us!’ I celebrated my birthday that night and had so much fun and laughter. One lasting memory now is the slow dance I shared with Eddie. Shortly after that I saw Eddie at a Christian concert in Belfast and I remember reminding him to call at my house for his piece of birthday cake. He never made it to collect his piece of cake!
That night I visited the family home and it was packed. There are no words to describe the atmosphere in the home. I do remember one of the church Elders reading Scripture and praying with the family and sensing that it helped me and comforted me. That’s when I saw Eddie for the last time. I remember looking at him and thinking how could a 20-year old’s life be cut down in this way? A 20-year-old is not supposed to die! Death brings such a finality to life. Funerals are held very quickly here in N.Ireland and Eddie’s was held on the Tuesday. The church was packed. The service was emotional and it was hard to take in what was happening. I do remember the singing and how moving the hymns were. The words again reached me and soothed me. One hymn was “God holds the key of all unknown’ and one verse was: God holds the key of all unknown, And I am glad; If other hands should hold the key, Or if He trusted it to me, I might be sad, I might be sad. The scenes outside as his coffin was prepared to be taken to the cemetery were heart breaking. A family was broken. A church family wounded. Friends devastated. A few years separate these photos of the family.I don’t have memories of the days after the funeral. I don’t know how I got through those days. I guess I went to college to keep up with my studies. Life was a blur and a fog as grief usually is. Back then, there were no opportunities for counselling, no grief share programmes, no action plans to help with big emotional issues. We just got on with life! We worked through it as we could, at times on our own, other times with those around us or near to us. I know my greatest Comforter was God Himself. I had just made a recommitment of my life to the Lord 17 months before Eddie’s death. I was growing as a young Christian and enjoying my renewed relationship with God. Despite the ‘newness’ of that relationship I was to prove how real God was through the loss of Eddie. He helped me, through Scripture, through words of hymns and I realised they were ‘comforting’ me in ways that nothing else could. He was reaching me and ministering to me and it made me realise He really was a ‘living God’. The comfort God brought to me was so special but there was another aspect to His work in my life at that time. Along with His comfort came His challenge. I sensed Him saying to me: ‘Laura if it had been you taken instead of Eddie, what would you have you to offer me? How have you served me? To my shame I had to look back on my life and realised that although I was seeking to live for God at that time, I had wasted many years of my life. I had become a Christian as a child, around the age of 8 years old. During my teenage years I had turned rebellious against all the Christian influences on my life. I had wanted to live my life and live it free of all the restraints I felt. I could only look back with regret. I had ‘nothing’ to offer the Lord. I began to think about heaven and wonder what it was like and what would Eddie be experiencing? Would he really be happy there? Learning about heaven and what will not be there, (no tears, or pain or sorrow) and what we will experience (inexpressible joy, God’s presence) was also comforting and exciting for me. Along with this challenge came the discovery that God had a plan for my life. That was so mind blowing. I believe this came out of my search for answers in the weeks after Eddie’s death. There came a deep impression upon me that ultimately ‘only what is done for Jesus will last’. This was a stark contrast to my drivenness in my Business & Management studies to get on in life, make money, get a car, a house, travel etc. As I began to pray and ask God to show me His plan for my life I noticed my passion for my studies and a career in business began to fade. The following year I did a Post Grad Diploma in Administration and Law and I did not enjoy it. New ideas were birthing within me and even the strangest of ones was the idea of going to a Bible College! The short version of that story is that within 18 months of Eddie’s death I started Belfast Bible College and I stepped out into a life of faith and dependence on God that continues to this day. It has taken me to Spain where I served for 27 years and now on to Kenya where I am presently serving. Does Eddie’s death still influence my life? Yes, I believe there are many ways Eddie’s death continues to influence my life.
Why am I sharing my experience? I am sharing it because as the title expresses, it is ‘the day that changed my life’. God used tragedy and loss to reach me and reveal Himself to me and then challenge me and guide me. It’s ‘a God story’ not really ‘my story’.
Also, I know there are so many people suffering grief and loss due to the Covid 19 pandemic and I can encourage them and anyone who are suffering to find hope and comfort in a God who is real and loves them and cares for them. I am sharing also because I believe God can bring good out of the life changing events in our lives – if we let Him. How can that happen?
The 20th February 1983 my life changed! I thank God He was there when it happened. He grabbed me and supported me and helped me though it. He then set me on a life journey that has been incredible with Him leading each step of the way. I pray that with or without a ‘day that changes your life’ you too will turn to God and let Him lead you on the life journey He has for you. Believe me, you will not regret it here, nor when you stand before Him one day when your life here is ended! Please take a moment to listen to the words of this great hymn. www.youtube.com/watch?v=ycz4s2xwDhc I would like to express my thanks Eddie’s family, his four siblings; Bobby, Jim, Valerie and Barbara Ann for their support of me writing this article and for providing the special family photographs and press cuttings from that day. Laura Sanlon 16/2/2021 1 Comment Pancake TuesdayI don’t normally post photos of food but today you can see I have. I haven’t done it to let you see what I had for breakfast but to show you a spiritual act of preparation for Lent 2021. Pancakes on Shrove Tuesday is not just a ‘fun meal or activity’ but full of deep spiritual meaning. It was the last meal prepared to use up sweet/rich ingredients before entering the period of Lent (self-denial) starting tomorrow (Wednesday) and lasting 40 days up to Easter. I have participated in Lent for many years and I have usually stopped eating chocolate. I have enjoyed breaking lent on Easter Sunday with a Cadbury’s chocolate egg (if possible) or one year at the Hotel Chocolat on Easter Monday with a friend. I know lent usually finishes on Easter Saturday but I have always found it significant to wait until Easter Sunday and celebrate fully the Resurrection of the Lord Jesus and break my personal lent. I wasn’t brought up to practice the tradition of lent but I have grown to embrace it in recent years and appreciate the benefit of focusing in a different way (and for me a deeper way) the meaning and purpose of Easter. As I intentionally stop doing something or eating something it is a daily reminder and possibly even a struggle which helps me reflect on all the Lord Jesus did for me. Denying myself something like chocolate then becomes such a pathetic gesture in the light of what Jesus suffered and gave up for me and for you. I guess Jesus’s ‘Pancake Tuesday’ was his baptism. His cousin John the Baptism baptised him and His Father spoke over him and his life from heaven and said: ‘This is my Son, whom I love; with him I am well pleased.’ Matthew 3:17 Jesus had done ‘nothing’ in terms of His ministry. He was just about to launch out on His ministry but His Father told Him He loved Him and was well pleased with Him BEFORE He had done anything. ‘THEN Jesus was led by the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil.’ Matthew 4:1 Jesus THEN went straight into a period of fasting for 40 days where we know he was tempted by the Devil. I don’t know if you have fasted for 40 days. I have not but I did observe someone who did 2 years ago. The Bishop I serve under did a water only fast for 40 days. It was an incredible experience to watch as he faded physically as the weight dropped off him as the weeks went by. He lost energy and even became very weak but he pushed through. Some might ask: why would you do that to yourself? It definitely was not easy! Something happened in the weeks and months that followed. He witnessed God move and work and answer prayers in powerful ways. I believe through that period he became more sensitive to God and what He was doing in his life. I learnt from observing the Bishop that God uses the practice of Spiritual Disciplines in our lives not to ‘gain points’ with Him or ‘to have our prayers answered’ but to build into our lives spiritual life and depth that cannot be achieved in other ways or measured in human scales. The Lord Jesus after His period of 40 days ‘Lent’ in the desert went on to do His greatest work ever; pushing through the physical pain of crucifixion, the emotional pain of seeing his disciples desert Him and the spiritual pain of His Father abandoning Him. He was able to do it, I believe, because of that time of ‘Lent’ spent in the desert with His Father. Those days of deliberate self-denial built into His soul, mind and body the ability and strength to face the greatest challenge this world has even seen or needed – His death to pay for our sin but also to ‘see’ spiritually ahead what would be achieved for eternity – the salvation of a lost world! He could ‘see it’ with joy! ‘Jesus, ………. For the joy set before him he endured the cross, scorning its shame, and sat down at the right hand of the throne of God.’ Hebrews 12:3 I don’t know how you are facing life right now, coping or not coping with Lockdown and all the challenges of this Covid 19 pandemic. I don’t know if you are going to have pancakes today or not. I don’t know if you are thinking of entering into ‘Lent’ by denying yourself something. Maybe you feel the pandemic has ‘denied’ you enough pleasures and joys of life without considering ‘giving up’ something else for the next 40 days. Can I encourage you to take time today on ‘Pancake Tuesday’ to stop and to reflect? To think of dedicating the next 40 days to invest in some special way in your spiritual life. To stop doing or eating something to give more time to God with a greater intensity due to your-self-denial. To create a new spiritual discipline or habit in your life. Wouldn’t it be amazing to emerge from Lockdown and the Pandemic and Lent as people with greater depth to our souls because we ‘invested’ in the most important part of who we are – the eternal part – our souls that will live on forever? We can emerge from all of this with JOY, as Jesus did, because of the ‘joy set before us’! Enjoy your pancakes today! I did! Laura Sanlon |