Your Listening Point

Dear Child,

Today is Easter Saturday 22 March 2008. I'm sitting here in a dining hall in Camp Manyung, Mt. Eliza together with Aunty SL, Aunty M, Uncle C, Winnie, and Uncle TK. We've come up from Melbourne to this place to celebrate Jesus' Death and His Resurrection. That is what Easter is all about.

Part of our celebrations this year, two people got baptized in the icy cold sea water yesterday evening. This is what individuals here get to do to symbolize making the important choice to follow Jesus Christ with all their lives.

During these few days of celebration, we had a number of sessions where we discussed who and where we were as a Community of Jesus Chirst Followers planted in the City.

One of the things daddy has learnt and would like for you to know is that the journey of life is a cyclic one. Our facilitator in one of the discussion workshops described it as being in three different coloured zones - green blue and red. I'm not absolutely familiar with that way of thinking yet, but Uncle Tim has been teaching us something similiar called "Listening Point cycles" (LP Cycles).

A listening point cycle consist of 4 phases - Living Life, Events Accumulating, a Listening Point, and a Choice Made which leads to a new level of Living Life.

At the Living Life stage, you would just have made a choice about an earlier LP, and things seem to be moving along pretty straightforwardly.

After a while of Living Life, things will begin to happen. Sometimes one big event will throw you straight into a Listening Point. Other times, it will take multiple small events before you're at a point where you're ready to listen.

At the Listening Point, it's the time when you're ready to hear from God. He'll speak to you in your prayer times. He'll also speak to you through people around you, through daddy or mommy or even your younger siblings. There is a certain sense of peace and sweetness that comes when you "hear" the voice of God. I hope I would have had the time to cultivate that sensitivity in you in the years that I get to spend with you.

At a Listening Point, you get to make a choice, which always comes in the form of the Spirit/Flesh response (although, this is a seperate discussion altogether). Please promise me you'll choose the Spirit. Choose love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, faith, goodness, humility, self-control.

Dear Child,

With every step you take in life, you'll find yourself somewhere on this cycle. Please remember that strength and health is found in going round and round as fast as possible. There is not point in staying at one place longer than you need to, and if you decide to go backwards, you'll get badly hurt.

Some people are going to come and tell you that one place is better than another. No! Don't listen to them. As you grow older, the size of the LP cycles will vary, and you might even find that there are multiple LP cycles going at the same time. By the time you're old enough to understand compound cycles, I believe you'll know how to deal with them.

With all this in mind, remember that this is a tool that we use to understand life. It is for giving us strength to engage with The Creator's Purposes, to follow in the footsteps of Jesus, to constantly be listening to The Spirit, and to be ruling the earth together will all the other human beings.

If it isn't already obvious, know that I love you. And I look forward to seeing what amazing things Our Creator is going to bring into being through you.

Love,

Dad