12th December 2021 All Age Service - Dave Food - The unexpected Guest

And so as we gather around your word this morning, Lord, I pray

that Lord, you'd help us to grasp hold of something more of you,

something more of your heart for our world, something more about your son Jesus.

And so, Father, open our eyes, open the eyes of our

hearts. Lord be glorified, even as we hear and study your word today,

we pray in Jesus' name. Amen. Our series for this month for

December is expectancy. I don't know whether you've had a guest to stay recently.

You're probably planning to have someone, or you're going somewhere at Christmas.

Many of us will be, even with masks and everything else that's going on,

will probably be going for a meal somewhere or gathering with people. And

so people are preparing. And just like the keeper said, you know,

there was a there was a census going on and people were traveling to go

somewhere, and the inn was full. And I don't want although although the

theme today, the theme for this month is expectancy, I want to talk

about the unexpected guest because we can still be expectant of the unexpected. Yeah,

if we're not ready for anything, then we're ready for nothing. I'll

say that again because I believe that if we're not ready for anything, we're

ready for nothing. And so I do want to talk about the unexpected guest.

The innkeeper shared in that video. He said, his mum said,

you know there was an extra plate. Make room. Make room in your

heart, because that's where it starts. Now, before you even think of

laying an extra place at the table, you have to think of it before

you do it. You have to think of it before you think of it.

You've got made room for it now. I don't know whether you're British

in this particular mindset, but I'm absolutely a believer in that. One of

the things I think we do is we go, oh, why don't you

pop around for tea? Imagine you're walking down Egham High Street and you see

a friend you haven't seen for a long time and say, oh, why

don't you come home for a coffee and why don't you stay for tea?

And then you're thinking, oh, we've only got two portions of chicken Kiev.

It's not going to work. So you get your diaries out, and

we get our diaries out and say, oh, how about in three weeks

time or four weeks time. Do you know how many times I think the

spirit is nudging us to just say, mate, room, I'm not talking

about strangers here and talk about people. We know those moments and those opportunities

when God gives us a space saying here's someone who needs my life, here's

someone who needs my encouragement, here's someone who needs to be lifted up.

But what goes on in our heads only two portions of chicken Kiev. I

probably some of you have definitely heard me tell this story before now, But

when I worked in Papua New Guinea, I was often walking through the bush

way, walking through the bush between villages because I was white and I was

unusual. There'd be people who come and join me, and they knew me.

They call me brother David. They couldn't believe that I was single,

so they all called me brother David. Brother, I your brother David,

how how are you? And I would tell them, and then we walked

through the bush and maybe we gather some mangoes on the way, and we

come to their village. And as we're walking through the village, they'd say,

oh, come and eat with us, And I didn't realize what was

going on. So i'd sit down and eat with them. And they have

a thing called a house wind, And a house wind is a house without

walls. So it's got a bamboo floor and it's got a roof to keep

out the sun on the rain when it rains. But you sit out there,

there's no walls, and you can get a bit of a breath of

fresh air if there isn't he if there is any wind, if there is

any breeze, And I sit down, and eventually food would come out,

and typically it would be great big metal plates piled high with root vegetables,

sweet potato, manioc, cassava, but great big chunks because you met with

your hands. So they'd be this great big plate full of root vegetables.

And then I'd get a plate and I'd pick up some root vegetables and start.

Then we'd take grace, and then I start to eat. What I

didn't realize was that those obvious of these root vegetables had been on for a

while. They hadn't just prepared them. They hadn't put them in the microwave.

They didn't have microwaves. We didn't have microwaves then, and so they'd

been in the pot already cooking for their lunch, and they served me,

and I sat down with some of the other members of the family. And

what I didn't realize in the first few times was I was eating somebody else's

lunch. And it was only after I realized that there were other people,

the rest of the family, sitting beside listening to the stories we were telling,

that I was a little more cautious about eating even a second piece of

potato because I was eating somebody else's lunch. But they made room. They

made room in their hearts, they made room around the table, they made

room with the food. Here's the trick. Here's a thought. Well,

why can't we cut up the chicken kiev into three portions and we all get

a bit or put a baked potato in the microwave today? That would be

easy, wouldn't it, just to add something more? But what we do

is we go, ah, this is too difficult, let's do it for

later. I really believe God wants to bring some unexpected moments into our world,

into our day. Think about this, You're just about to go He's

just about going to a Zoom meeting or teams meeting, or just about to

go out the front door and the phone rings, and you look at your

handset and think, oh, I know who that is. I haven't got

time right now. Well, sometimes we haven't. Sometimes we genuinely haven't,

but many times it's just here in our heads. Oh, I was walking

out the door. I don't have time right now. A few years ago

now, I walked out of my front door. I was going to catch

the train into London. And as I walked out of the drive, there

was somebody walking down the road or I hadn't seen for a while, who

lived just around the corner from us. And we walked down the road,

chatting together. And we came to the end of Grange Road and I was

going to head towards the train and he was going to head towards Central Egghan.

I said, oh, I've been really good to see you. Do

you know what. I went off down Graves Road. He there was room

for more conversation. I could have walked all the way to Central Egan.

Here's the thing. I was thinking, I've got to catch this train.

I didn't have to catch that train. I had plenty of time. I

could have caught the next train. I could have had an extra half an

hour with his person. But I didn't because in my head I had this

timetable, I had not made room. And so as the innkeeper said make

room, all Joseph asked was please. Didn't say anymore. It didn't plead

you, just please, let's have a look at Luke chapter twenty one,

verses twenty five to thirty one. And there will be signs in the sun,

in the moon, and in the stars, and on the earth,

distress of nations with perplexity, the sea and the waves roaring men's hearts,

fading them from fear and from the expectation of those which are coming on the

earth. For the powers of the heavens will be shaken. Then they will

see the Sun of Man coming in a cloud with power and great glory.

Now then we see these things begin to happen. Look up and lift up

your heads, because your redemption draws near. Then he spoke to them a

parable look at the fig tree and all the trees when they are ready buddying,

you will see, and you will know for yourself that summer is now

near. So you also, when you see these things happening, know that

the Kingdom of God is near. There are signs. There are signs,

and sometimes we don't pay attention to them. Sometimes we don't think. Sometimes

we just need to make space. We need to make room. I want

to encourage each one of us that Christmas is a busy time. You've probably

probably got a list of things we need to do. I once remember going

around to see a couple who John and yvon knowing sorry John and yvon footage,

who lived in Egham Hive, and we used to have an after meet

after the evening service. There's a bit of a memory thought, you know,

we used to have an evening service and we used to have an after

meat sometimes after we go to different people's houses, and I remember yvon One

suddenly saying, I'm praved. My house is a mess. Now I knew

Yvonne was particular about keeping our Heights house tied. She was always k what

she meant, what she hadn't gone around with an extra polish. I said,

if on, it'll be fine, and it was, and we went

back for the after meeton and there was this phrase that's stuck in my head

ever since. People are more important than polish. So please, I'm not

encouraging us to bring strangers to our table. What I am saying is for

those we know, those we love, those who we're familiar with, we

need space and time to encourage one another. Let's make time, Let's take

time, and let's do what God has designed us to do, fellowship together.

I think the world is crying out for a relationship. The world is

crying out for and we're probably all doing it ourselves. We're all crying out

for a bit more connection. And I don't mean a bit more WhatsApp and

I don't mean a bit more Zoom or teams. I'll be honest with you,

I'm sick and tired of teams in zoom. I don't know what you

feel like. I'm sick or tired of staring at as camera. Now.

I know Maggie encouraged us that, but we've got we've got to get beyond

just staring at a screen to building relationship. I've started doing with some of

the people that I work with. I'm saying, Okay, I'm going to

book in my I'm going to book in my calendar that I start. I'm

going to log on five minutes earlier in the meeting to have a bit of

a chat before we get into business because you know, that's what would normally

happen, isn't it What would normally happen. You meeting in a meeting room,

you'd gather, you have maybe able to tea and coffee, and you'd

be chatting about the weekend and maybe your football team or whatever. You'd be

building relationship. You know. Now we jump from meeting to meeting to meeting.

We jump from country, to different parts of the world, to different

people. You know, I don't know what your brain's like, but mine's

often fried jumping from this meeting to that meeting to this meeting. That there's

no space, there's no time to breathe, there's no time for a relationship.

And I'm deliberately trying to make time for a relationship now, and deliberately

tried to make some opportunity for the unexpected. I I had an opportunity to

to make One of the companies I worked with, we had a secret center,

and so I bought this person in a particular present and I was just

trying to sound him out because it was a nice thing they did. They

asked each person to give a gift to a charity and let the person know

the gift that being given to the charity. So that's nice that you know

each it's gonna be. So I then have to research, Okay, what

what's he into? So I'm not going to name him because otherwise I'll know

what his secret center was. But I then did some research, so I

was I was. I got on the call early. I was just chatting

to him, and as I was chatting to him, I was trying to

Okay, so so you know, what are you doing at Christmas? And

you know, what have you been doing at the weekend. I was just

trying to find out what his interests were a bit more to work out what

to give to. But I'll tell you what we got talking about Christmas?

He said, yeah, I said, what do you like about Christmas?

This is the way the conversation was going. And here's the thing. I

think we're losing a bit of the art of conversation too. We don't know

what to say anymore, you know, And I just say, well,

Ojay, I'm gonna I'm going to learn to chitchat, because I'm not great

at chitchat. Some of you know. I was a police chaplain for Surrey

Police for a number of years and I found I was really rubbish at the

job. If I'm honest with you, I'm really rubbish at the job.

Some of the other chaplains. I'd say, how do you do this?

They say, well, you need to linger with purpose and loiter with intent.

And I went, what do you mean? They said, well,

just turn up at the police station and you know, just hang around and

chat to people when they offer to make them coffee. Do you know what.

The only way I could do it was I ended up buying boxes of

donuts and taking a box of donuts, so then I had an excuse to

then say would you like a donut? And I'd go around the whole police

station offer donuts to people and at the same time after to make them a

cup of coffee or a cup of tea. And then in making the cup

of coffee and cup of tea and serving it to them, there was a

place for conversation, do you know? It was just I needed a little

something. And one of the reasons why, one of the reasons why we

give you all these things is to start that conversation too. And so please

keep on taking the bags and the pens and the mugs and give them away

and find an appropriate opportunity to do it. I was, where was I

bless you? I was a couple of weeks ago. I was. I

was in Costa meeting someone, and whilst I was meeting them, I could

see someone on the next table and they were trying to read something in their

newspaper. And I said, hey, I hope you don't mind. I've

got something that might help you. And I had one in my pocket.

I've always nearly always had one in my pocket. And I pulled it out

and gave it to them, and then they read what they needed to read.

The would look at the ingredients and something, and then they gave to

give it back to me. I said, no, no, you keep

it. If it's useful once, it will be useful again. Oh,

thank you very much. And then they looked at it and they oh,

running me a Christian fellowship? What's that? Then? You know? No,

obviously, no even concept of church. So I told them a little

bit about us. Just don't know, you never know. Make room,

make Let's make room in our hearts for conversation, Let's make room in our

hearts for acts of love. Let's make room in our lives. So random

acts of kindness do so anybody remember the Canadian teams that used to come to

church. We used to have them staying at New Road. Rod Donison used

to leave many of them and they came and they turn up and one of

the things that they did as a strategy was r ak random acts of kindness.

They would pray in the morning. They would gather as a group in

the morning. They'd sit in the ballpool that's in the other room next door.

They'd sit in the ball pool as a prayer focus. There'd be ten,

twelve, fourteen of them and then they pray, and they then decide

what they were going to take with them, and they would so some people

would take chewing gum. Some people would take various things. I remember one

guy said God told him to take a tie, so he put a tie

in his pocket. And then I can't remember was it McDonald's or burger King

or some They were sitting in a burger king and there was this guy looking

very panicked, and he was reaching in all his pockets. He had a

jacket and a suit on and an open necked shirt and he was reaching in

all his pockets. And a sudden he starting to look a bit panicked,

and the guy reached across him and said, I hope you don't mind.

He said, are you okay? And the guy said, I'm just going

for a job interview and I've left my tie at home. The guy just

imagine you might just say this is a coincidence, if that's what you want

to think. I don't believe in coincidences. I mean, I believe in

God instances. So there was this guy and he said, do you know

what he said? I felt that I should put a tie in my pocket

this morning, and so I'd like to give you my tie. And the

guy said, really, what made you put the tie in your pocket?

And then he explained he took five or ten minutes. And the guy said

that's amazing. And the guy from the Canadian team, I can't even remember

his name now. He just looked at the guy and said, just remember

this moment. Let's just pause and remember this moment that God loves you enough

that he told me to put a tie in my pocket. And then we

happened to meet in Burger King or wherever it was. I can't remember that

bit. You just just think about it. Think about how big a God

is and how much He cares for you. Now, the point I want

to make in this story is not that God is great and that God can

tell us what we need to do, but the fact that the person who

was there listened and made room. He didn't go, oh, tie in

my pocket. Why would I put it. I've only got one tie and

that's for Sunday. Why would I put a tie in my pocket? He

made room. He made room for the possibility. Just imagine how frustrating it

would have been if he thought put the tie in your pocket and said,

no, no, it's a silly idea. And so he leaves the tie

behind, and then he has the conversation with his guy in Burger king He'd

go, Ah, I wish i'd put the tie in my pocket. Now,

God is such an amazing God. God is such an incredible God.

God loves us so much. And sometimes we don't know the times and the

seasons. In Mark chapter thirteen, verses thirty two and thirty three, it

says, but of that day and the hour, no one knows, not

even the angels in heaven nor the son, but only the Father. Take

heed, watch and pray for you do not know when the time is.

He talks about the return of our Savior, talks about you know, there's

lots of stories in all of the Gospels to talk about be ready. I'm

not talking about being ready for your next guest. I'd be ready for the

unexpected. Be ready for those moments when God wants to use you and me

in small but miraculous ways. I was in Mexico with Letty speaking a number

of churches in Mexico, and we went to Veeps. Now, Veeps is

a chain in America and Latin America. I wouldn't know how to compare it,

but they served nice food anyway. And we were sitting at this table,

and I was sitting at this table with Benjamin, who was the pastor

of the church, Letty and somebody else can't remember who that was. And

as we were sitting there, every time I was looking at Benjamin, at

the corner of my eye, I could see this lady sitting on the table

next to us, and you know, sometimes at the corner of her eye

just keep on getting distracted. You're not quite sure why it is. Is

it they're moving, or is it they're wearing something? And I just kept

on looking and it couldn't work out why I was getting distracted until I'd recognized

it was the only spirit game boy they and so I spoke to Lettie.

I said, Letty, I don't know this lady, but I think I

have a word for her. I didn't know what I was going to say.

I just said, I think I have a word for this lady.

And so Letty turned to this lady and translated and said, they've surpassed from

the UK and just like to share something with you that's okay. And so

I shared this word. I spoke to this lady and after I shared it,

she suddenly she started laughing. And she started laughing and said, why

are you laughing? She spoke a little English. She said, well,

I've just realized that I know Letty and her and Letty knew one another.

I did, They'd worked together years before, and they started talking. And

then just think, in these few moments, I just shared what I shared,

and the lady was so encouraged. But it also rekindled a relationship for

Letty as well. There's a coincidence. God, It's just such a good

God. But we need to have to make room to the possibility of God

wants to use it. You know if we if our if our blinkers are

on, and we're doing that, and that's what we're doing, there's no

room for anything else. Why why do horses in horse races wear blinkers because

their owners and their riders want them to be so focused on the finish line

they can't even see the competition, you know, they shut out the competition.

All they can see is straight ahead. We can get like that too

in our world. We can get like that too, where we can say

I am so busy, I don't have time to do this. Do you

know We've all got time. It's just how do we use it. People

are more important than polish prayer. It's more important than the TV. I'm

not saying you can't watch the TV. Please don't hear me wrong. I

just think, you know, if we if we think, oh i've got

I've got to watch this, actually there's the record button, there's watched later

now. I mean, I don't know how much TV you watch these days.

That's live For me, it's very very little. Most of it's record,

so I'm free to watch it whenever I want to watch it. I

mean, there was a time in our world where people would usher you out

of the house because something was just about to start. Does it happened to

you, It certainly happened to me a couple of times where people said,

Oh, it's time to go, We've got to get home for this,

to watch this. We don't have any of that anymore. So take heed,

watch and pray for you do not know. You do not know.

We do not know what the time is, and times and seasons are things

we need to pay attention to. So let me pray. Father. We

read in the Nativity story, we read of Mary and Joseph coming to an

inn and needing a place to stay, and the innkeeper making room. Father,

help us to make room for the possibility that you want to use us

today. Help us to make room to the possibility you want us to connect

again with someone we haven't connected with for a while. Father, help us

to make room in our hearts to give both to time, maybe sometimes money,

maybe sometimes food and fellowship. But Father, help us to make room.

What we do with our time, Lord, reflects what's important to us.

Father. I think for all of us, we want to say,

Lord, we want to do more of what you want us to do,

not just what's in our diaries, what's in our agenda, although that can

be important, But Father, the moments in between, the opportunities that come

rather, help us to continue to be an encourager. Help us to bring

joy into joy theous situations. Help us to bring peace where there is conflict.

Father, help us to be your agents. Have change, Lord,

that we would be expectant that Lord, when we do what you call us

to do, there would be change, There would be impact, there would

be blessing. Father, let us not be surprised by the magnitude of what

you can do in us and through us for your glory in Jesus' name.

Amen, Amen, this will we give you a bit of a ps.

I wrote some notes down about how you might do this, and these are

just some I wouldn't say these were biblical or they're not anti biblical either,

but just a few thoughts. When you book things in your diary, whatever

your calendar system is, it probably books them to the hour. I'm just

trying to think about making space in our worlds. You know, when you

create an appointment in your diary, it automatically makes it an hour. Just

learn a little habit to make it shorter. Go in there and change it.

So the meeting's from ten till eleven. No, I'm not going to

book it from ten to eleven. I'm going to book it from ten till

ten to eleven. So we give you a space. He gives space in

our day rather than going from a meeting to meeting to meeting. Also deliberately

put in your diaries space for social type. So I've deliberately for a couple

of meetings I've done recently, I've sent them a meeting for ten minutes before

that or five minutes before the meeting. And so what's this, Dave?

And so I just thought I'd like to grab a coffee, let's have a

chat before the meeting starts, before we get into business. And I didn't

send it to everybody. It wasn't me meeting with six people. It's just

one person for five minutes beforehand. And I found it works. Let me

encourage you, maybe take a walk rather than go in the car. It's

going to be good for your legs, it's going to be good for your

waistline. And then see who you want. You know you can't well,

you don't want to bump into somebody whilst you're driving. You can bump into

someone whilst you're walking, and then you can walk together, and then you

could have a conversation. Here's another suggestion. We need to get out in

the fresh air. We need to get out. We need to be in

places where it's healthy to be. Go for a walking meeting rather than in

the room meeting. You know, if you decide to meet someone at Costa

rather than meeting them at in coster and sitting down, why not buy two

costers together. Other coffee shops are available by the way, Grab your costers

and go for a walk, get fresh air, you know, and also

probably you'll have a different conversation. One of the things that I noticed whenever

I went to Gidead was the best conversations happened when we were working on stuff.

Not sitting at a table looking at one another, that's quite an intense

thing, but working on stuff walking together, walking across the fields, conversations would start