A few days in Tampere

So a few weeks ago, I went to Tampere (about 2 hours from Helsinki by car) for about 4 days, the first two of those with Eva. It was great to see Antti and Anni, Aki and Maria and their families, who I've known for a few years. We got to spend time with them and pray for them, which was cool. Their hospitality and generosity was a real blessing.

On the second day we visited a nearby cafe, which is run by local Christians. It has an area for people to come and worship and pray, and also sells tasty waffles. We spent some time just worshiping Jesus there and praying for the area, and also prayed for two of the staff there. We did eat waffles too - they were good.

The third day was Saturday, and I was at a 'housechurch day' for people from different parts of Finland. I helped lead some worship there, which was good - always fun singing in finnish. I'm starting to try to be adventurous and sing 'free-flow' in finnish - usually only very basic phrases, but hey. The day was really good - we shared in small groups about our experiences of housechurch, and inpsired and challenged each other. Thankfully the people in my small group were all able to speak english well.

The next day I took a train to Kauhava, about 2 hours north by train, and then got a lift from there to Evijärvi, where I was at a 12-day-long Intercession Seminar (will write about that soonish)

So, after the 'housechurch day' I felt really encouraged to keep pursuing this vision of small communities, focused around worship and prayer, and relationship with one another. It was good to be challenged again on being 'missional' communities, because our small communities can quite easily remain inward-focused. It is personally a challenge as I'm not particularly a natural evangelist, but I know God wants to bring His life to people around me and I'm a channel for His life. Sometimes we think we have nothing to give, but when we look at some of the truly broken people around us, we see that we have so much to share. The same Holy Spirit that raised Jesus from the dead is in us, but it is so easy for me to forget this.

I really want to see these communities among young people here. We've been having gatherings with some people here recently, and it's been great to worship together, to cry out to God for our city and nation (and other things), and pray and prophesy into each other's lives.

Yesterday afternoon we spent about 4 hours doing these things, and it was wonderful. I'm hoping and praying that in the new year we will be able to keep these gatherings going and perhaps make them more regular.
I pray that we as young people would have a clear vision of Who God is, of what He wants to do (so we may intercede, and be part of the answer to our prayers), and that God would continue to heal us and transform us from glory into glory.