Thoughts & opinion from the southampton vineyard team

by Matt Hyam on 5th March, 2009

I am so blown away by the sacrifice and generosity of everyone who took part in Fab Feb. I cannot believe how much people have given. I know that the money will literally change lives. For the kids in India and Zimbabwe it will mean life and not death and for people in Southampton it will mean food on the table or help out of the choking grip of debt.

But, all this week, something has been rattling round my head. The one question that just will not go away.

Just think.

Just imagine.

What if?

What if we, as followers of Jesus throughout the western world, lived like this all the time?

What if we really did not buy into Babylon?

What if we chose to live in a way that flies in the face of our greed-driven culture?

What if we modelled a way of life that is possible and is radical and the world could see this?

What if?

What if we even just met somewhere “in the middle”.

I am not sure “what if”, but I am pretty sure that the church would truly be an amazing power for good in the world and the world would surely be a different place.

A better place.

Much, much better.

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by Matt Hyam on 2nd March, 2009

At the time of writing, people have given nearly £23,400 (and this does not include the money that people have given independent of the “central” church collections.)

This equates to £23,400 that people have chosen to not put into savings and not spend on themselves (on top of normal giving) , in favour of giving it those who are in need.

This equates to people choosing to humble themselves and question whether “privilege” is a “right”.

This equates to people making sacrifices in the way that they live their lives in order to identify with those who do not have this choice.

This is the spirit of jubilee.

This is the kind of church that I want to be part of!

I have not spoken to anyone who has not really questioned their financial habits as a result of this month. I know that we will be living differently as a result. Some people have even taken the radical step of choosing to continue with it. That’s when it becomes Mad March!

It has made us think about how much we just spend and not even think about it. It has made us wonder why we buy some of the things that we do. It has made us think about why we are not paying off mortgages much quicker and giving away much more.

So, in summary, in my humble opinion, even though my son poured blackcurrant squash ALL over the white sofa and even though I hammered a nail through one of the heating pipes, Fab Feb was, indeed, fab.

Do it again?

Watch this space.

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by Matt Hyam on 6th February, 2009

Its been a long time since I last wrote anything.

Sorry about that. You know. Christmas, small children, trips to Zimbabwe and Pastor’s conferences and all that jazz.

Anyway, I am here now so I need to think of something significant to say.

Hmmm.

Well, I feel like God’s been on my case this last week or so. Something happened to me at the Vineyard Leaders’ conference and it has scarred me.

In a good way.

God just convicted me. I have spent some time saying sorry to people and dealing with issues of unforgiveness. I gotta tell you. I feel a WHOLE lot better for it.

I got fed up with being angry with people. I got fed up with decisions that I was making being guided by issues that I had or “stuff”.

I don’t feel angry anymore.

Actually, let me rephrase that. I feel really angry that we live in a world where children starve to death and where people’s love of money and oil and gold leads then to kill and torture and destroy and consume. I feel livid that people go to bed hungry while we throw away food. I feel enraged that the church in the west is still focussed on getting meetings right whilst the one’s who Jesus came for are still hungry and lonely and marginalised and broken.

So, yes, I do feel angry.

But I think that I am supposed to feel angry about those things. Assuming that this anger leads to the kind of revolution that Jesus wants.

I just don’t feel angry with people who have hurt me anymore. I am not clinging on to some twisted sense of justice whereby I want them to fail so I can be proved right.

I feel like a weight has gone off my shoulders.

Its much nicer being friends with people.

I like that feeling. I think I might stick with it.

So. Now I want to keep short accounts, which is Christian for, I want to deal with things straight away now – forgive, ask forgiveness. Let go.

You know, like Jesus said.

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by Matt Hyam on 24th November, 2008

Jubilee.  How’s it going to work?  Is it going to work?  Is it just going to be a bit of tokenism to keep us from feeling guilty for a year and we can live on the memories for a few more years.

Honestly?  I really do not know!

Anyone who saw the news last week could not have missed the stuff about baby P.  How can anyone do that to a 17-month old child?  How can a human being be capable of such incredible evil?  How can we live in a world where things like this can happen?  My youngest son is 17-months old.  I have been holding him that much tighter, kissing him that much more often and appreciating all his crazy little “characteristics” so much more, for the last week or so.  How can anyone be capable of that?  How could it happen?

I cannot begin to comprehend what kind of person is capable of this.  Or what kind of life could shape a person to be capable of this.  There is a saying, “hurt people hurt people”.  How much hurt makes someone do that?!

The only thing that I do know is that our God has called us to be salt and light.  He has sent us to the broken-hearted; to heal the sick; to set the captives free.

We just cannot do nothing.

We just cannot sit in meetings singing “Jesus is my boyfriend” songs and do nothing.

We have to do something.

We have to.

We have to go to the broken-hearted and let God heal them.

That broken-hearted person who gets healed may just be the one who was going to turn into the person who tortures to death a 17-month-old child.

So, you see, Jubilee has to work.  It just has to.  Otherwise what is the point?  What are we doing?

There’s a line from a Bruce Cockburn song, that U2 nicked – “I’m gonna kick the darkness til it bleeds daylight!”

Underneath everything; that is what jubilee is really about.

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by Matt Hyam on 23rd October, 2008

So I was at a meeting the other week with a famous guy that I have never heard of. He was pretty good, actually. He really made me think and I have not stopped thinking about it since.

He said (and he was using BROAD brush-strokes) that the church has four main functions:

1. Worship (meetings, prayer meetings, devotional life etc etc)
2. Community
3. Mission
4. Discipleship

He reckoned that the emphasis of the church has been on “worship” and that the other three fit in with that. In other words, community happens AT MEETINGS, discipleship is listen to a sermon AT MEETINGS and mission is bringing your friends TO MEETINGS.

He argues (and I agree with him) that the emphasis should be on mission. He argues (and I agree with him) that if this is the case then the other three just happen.

Think about it. When you go on a mission trip, you don’t have to tell people to pray and you don’t have to tell people to work out community and you know that you are learning throughout the whole thing.

After all, that is how Jesus did it.

So, we are here for a reason. We have a purpose.

I may be wrong about a lot of things but I can guarantee that this reason is not to have meetings!

I read an e-mail this week about a crime that was committed in this country some years ago. It has disturbed me so much that I will not even tell you what it is about because I don’t want anyone to feel the way that I do now. But it served as a stark and powerful reminder to me that we live in an evil world and that we are the light of that world and that we are the hope of the world.

So, like I said, we’re here for a reason. We have a purpose…

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by Matt Hyam on 25th September, 2008

When I first encountered Jesus, I was overwhelmed with love.  In the words of Depeche Mode I, “found new life, fell in love with everything.”

I think that is the way that it is meant to be.  Isn’t it?

I remember the excitement that I felt over meeting brothers and sisters from all over the world whom I never even knew existed before.

Over time, I grew and eventually reached the point where I knew everything and so no longer do I have that abandoned love for my brothers and sisters because some of them are “wrong”.

As I have grown a bit more I began to realise that, perish the thought, I was wrong about some things.

Now, I realise that we are all wrong.  Yes, there is objective truth, but, no, I have never met anyone with an objective view of that truth.  Sure, there are those “prophectic” people who claim to speak the very words of God, but, frankly, I am not sure that I believe them.  Certainly not all of them.

So, back to love.

Isn’t love what its all about?

Wasn’t it love that caused the Father to create us?

Wasn’t it love that caused him to call a people to himself through whom he would save the world

Wasn’t it love that caused him to send his son to save humanity?

Wasn’t it love that caused him to save a wretch like me?

Isn’t it love that should compel us to serve one another and to reach to the poor and the lost and the lonely and the oppressed.

Isn’t it love that should motivate us to forgive each other and to prefer one another’s needs?

Does Jesus himself not pray that we would be known by the way that we love each other?

As I read the things said about Todd Bentley on the web, written by those who say they love Jesus, I just want to cry.  How can you say those things about anyone and think it is okay?

I feel such a deep, deep sadness.

As I look at situations close to home where those who say they love Jesus, cling to bitterness and unforgiveness and seek to punish others or take revenge on others for their hurt, I cannot understand it.

If anyone says, “I love God,” yet hates his brother, he is a liar. – 1 John 4:20

Love.  Its meant to be about love.

Not who is the most right.  Not who is the most holy.  Not who is the most pious.  Not who knows the Bible best.  Not who is the best at winning arguments.

Love.

If it is not about love, then we may as well pack up and go home, because we’re all liars.

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by Matt Hyam on 14th September, 2008

I was shocked to hear some sad news this week.

I heard that Todd Bentley – the evangelist from the Lakeland revival – has filed for divorce with his wife and that a number of improprieties have come to light in terms of his behaviour, over some time.

I feel sad because, first, I think, “there but for the grace of God, go I”.

I feel sad for his wife.

I feel sad because I think that so much of what his heart was for, is now discredited.

I feel angry because I see the two extremes in the church.

One one hand, those who had whole-heartedly embraced and accepted all that he did and said without reference to scripture. Who threw themselves into it all and allowed themselves to build a cult of personality. These people must be feeling like its all fallen apart around them and what can they believe.

On the other hand I see those who had literally referred to him as the devil and the things that they had said in the name of Jesus are, frankly, unbelievable and, honestly, they’d better come up with some AMAZING excuse before they have to give account to their Lord. These people must be rubbing their hands together shouting from the roof-tops “I told you so!”

Me?

I feel sad and angry (as I explained above) but it does not change anything for me. As I said when I went there I thought the teaching was really dodgy, I didn’t hear much about Jesus and I did not like the style. But I was and am still convinced that it was God.

Man, if we wait for us to be perfect before God will use us then we are in SERIOUS trouble!

I hate people on pedestals. Hate it.

I hear about the guy from Hillsongs who wrote a song about his terminal cancer and everyone’s singing it everywhere and then it comes out that he was lying and he does not have terminal cancer! Even his family did not know!

I hate pedestals.

Let me spell it out.

IT IS ABOUT JESUS!

If we put superstars up in front of Jesus then we are obscuring the view. When God moves in power, it should leave us with a clearer vision of our saviour. If revival brings a whole host of new superstars who (whether with a pure heart or not) become famous and wealthy on the back of it, then we have SERIOUSLY missed the point. So, when you go to see the music leader from Lakeland on his “tour of the UK”, ask yourself why?!

I hate pedestals!

There is only room for one person on the pedestal and that is Jesus. Not superstar evangelists, not superstar musicians, not superstar preachers, not superstar pastors. Just Jesus.

When you see someone on that pedestal, if you love them, you’d better pray for them to get down because being put in the place of Jesus when you are not Jesus is only going end one way.

So, lets pray for Todd Bentley and then lets get on with fixing our eyes on Jesus, healing the sick, casting out demons, raising the dead, setting the captives free, loving the lonely, feeding the hungry and being part of the Rule of God coming.

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by Matt Hyam on 19th August, 2008

Its been a while.

Thanks for being patient.

I have just come back from “camp”. This is a watersports camp called “Aquasports” (the clue is in the title) that we are involved in every year. I was looking forward to this year’s camp for two reasons; first, I forgot that we live in England and had some romantic notion of hot, sunny, windless days by the lake. We almost had that, apart from the torrential rain and the cold, 40mph winds!

The other reason I was excited was because I reckoned that I would have loads of chances to pray for people for healing. I did. Which was not too astonishing as it is easy to be bold on a Christian camp. What was astonishing was the number who were healed. I think that I prayed for maybe 15 people, of whom NINE were healed! That’s crazy! It all just feels normal now – just like that’s what happens when you pray for people!

None of them where in “meetings”, all were just “as and when” it came up. I am awaiting confirmation on some of them, but one was a broken bone in the foot that has since been confirmed as “fully healed”, another was a prolapsed disc that stopped hurting when prayed for, then an arthritic knee which has not hurt since, but I am still waiting to see about whether that is healed.

Normal church life? Perhaps it should be. I really am not making a big deal about it and I am certainly not going to put on more meetings, but I feel so full of faith now that sometimes I am almost not surprised when someone gets better – almost!

Two weeks ago, I felt challenged to pray for a friend who is blind, I ended up having to chase him up a hill carrying three bags of shopping and laying hands on him on a street corner. He wasn’t healed. The thing is though, it was not embarrassing. It used to be, but it is not now. I just asked if I could have another go next time I saw him, and he said that would be fine.

I’ll tell you what I want. What I really, really want…

I want a, I want a..

I want to see everyone doing this. I want this to become completely normal church life for Southampton Vineyard. Not our focus, not even a something we teach on, have meetings for, or give much platform to; but just something that God is doing, all the time, in the background as part and parcel or normal church life!

I can’t heal anyone! Neither can you. It HAS to be God!

In March, God spoke to me and said that our church should be known, not because of kids work or teaching or community, but because God is there! Seems like its happening.

So, how’s everyone else doing with the challenge to pray for 100 people?

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by Matt Hyam on 8th July, 2008

Right. I have been back from Florida for two weeks now.

One of the things that God said to me whilst I was there was to pray for 100 people for healing and then let’s talk!

In that time I have prayed for 25 people, specifically for healing (I don’t mean in “Ministry times”, coz that’d be easy to do 100). Of those 25, 6 seem to have been healed or experienced partial healing or the symptoms have gone. (Others seem to have experienced significant emotional/spiritual healing and this is absolutely amazing to see and life-changing, but for the purposes of keeping it quantifiable and subjective and not being open to accusations of psychological mumbo jumbo, we’ll just talk about the physical healings here).

1 out of 4 ain’t bad. Wow! No one is more surprised than I!

One of the disturbing things for me is that people keep thinking that there is something special about me and asking me to pray for them to be healed. Now, if God has told them to do that, then that’s fine and dandy, but if they think that this is something to with me then I am afraid that they will disappointed. Very disappointed.

Why am I seeing so many healed? Well, my best guess is that I am actually praying for more people to be healed. That is always a good start. Also, I just feel more expectant and full of faith (spelled R-I-S-K, remember) so I am just looking for opportunities.

Actually, last week, two people were healed at our service and I had nothing to do with praying for either of them, so there you go.

So, here’s my challenge to you.

Pray for 100 people to be healed. Here’s the rules:

Rule #1 – If someone is sick, take the opportunity to pray for them for healing. Wherever you are, whenever you can.

Good rules, eh?

I’m serious. Go for it. I have NEVER had anyone refuse prayer. Ever. Sure, you’re gonna look stupid if they don’t healed… or maybe you won’t. You’ll probably make them feel loved and cared about. Anyway, if you did look stupid, so what? John Wimber used to talk about a man with a sandwich board that said “I’m a fool for Christ” on the front and on the back it said, “who’s fool are you?”

So, there you are. Who’s fool do you want to be?

So, take up the challenge! Pray for 100 people for healing and then let’s talk. Let me know how you are doing along the way, though.

Come on, I dare you.

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by Matt Hyam on 27th June, 2008

Well. I returned from Florida on Monday morning. I went to see what was going on with the “Florida outpouring”.

I went because God told me (long story that I won’t bore you with here). I knew that I needed it. All these years of focussing on the poor and justice and disciplines and “our” response to God and walking out discipleship have left me too “self-sufficient”. I totally believe in all those things – more than ever, actually, but I needed God to seriously break into my life and recapture my heart.

The question that everybody asks me with excited expression is, “so how was it?

Honestly?

I was bored.

I thought there was a great deal of hype.

I thought that there was a lot of dodgy theology.

I heard a lot about “the revival” and very little about Jesus.

I thought that it was a very individualistic gopsel that I heard and I heard nothing about the poor or about justice.

BUT. and it is a BIG “but”; God is definately in it! It is the real thing. I saw loads healed and miracles and even though I sat for six hours bored, I came away changed.

For me, it was the times away from the meetings where I saw and experienced God’s power and felt his “presence”.

I have come home and I feel excited about Jesus again. I know he has changed something. I actually feel like a Christian again! I have had so many oppurtunities to pray for people – most of them outside the church. I feel faith for healing again. In our housegroup meeting we experienced the power of God like I have not known in years – and we hadn’t even been singing any songs! (Obviously God the Holy Spirit has not read all the teaching on “worship”). This morning, I prayed for someone who was deaf – and they were healed!!!!!! But I’ll let them tell you about that…

I listened to Loz’s talk form last week – listen to it; now!! I felt that God spoke to me about Acts 2, wilsts he was speaking about what happened after Pentecost. Let me quote it:

“And the disciples said to each other, “this is great! Lets come back every day and do this”

No they didn’t. They started living it out, caring for the poor, loving each other, sharing their lives in common and slowly, slowly, changing the world.

I feel that God has told me to pray for 100 and then we can talk about it. I am on 12 now and more than half have been out on the streets and, so far, one has been healed and another awaiting confirmation. I tell you what though. I am taking EVERY opportunity I get to pray for people now.

So, I want to see God’s power more and more. Yeah BABY! (technical, theological term)

Let’s get out there this time, hey?

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