September Conference

Sadly i couldn't come one both of conference days, just in Sunday, but it brought me a lot of blessings.
The subject of conference was "New vine, new wineskin" and the subject of tribune was "New people, new mission". The preacher was Toma Magda from Croatia.
In the morning he thought from the book of Luke, chapter 5:33-39 where it says: They said to him, "John's disciples often fast and pray, and so do the disciples of the Pharisees, but yours go on eating and drinking." Jesus answered, "Can you make the guests of the bridegroom fast while he is with them? But the time will come when the bridegroom will be taken from them; in those days they will fast." He told them this parable: "No one tears a patch from a new garment and sews it on an old one. If he does, he will have torn the new garment, and the patch from the new will not match the old. And no one pours new wine into old wineskins. If he does, the new wine will burst the skins, the wine will run out and the wineskins will be ruined. No, new wine must be poured into new wineskins. And no one after drinking old wine wants the new, for he says, 'The old is better.'

It doesn't says that old i bad, old-fashioned people aren't good, they are, but they are not capable to except things like new people does. We have other priorities, but if we seek God -wineskin- we all suppose to live like one wine, not to mix it, but to find a way to work together. We have to go out and bring new people to church, but put it in surrounding to feel comfortable. That is why church needs healthy elders, youth, prayer hours and so on. And those together make a good wine. Well, in nature when you mix new and old wine it gets sour and bad, but if you mix generation in church it can bring only good thing out. New ideas with wise old experience can just improve things, not make it bad.


Afternoon Toma thought about John 5:1-15 which says: Some time later, Jesus went up to Jerusalem for a feast of the Jews. Now there is in Jerusalem near the Sheep Gate a pool, which in Aramaic is called Bethesda and which is surrounded by five covered colonnades. Here a great number of disabled people used to lie—the blind, the lame, the paralyzed. One who was there had been an invalid for thirty-eight years. When Jesus saw him lying there and learned that he had been in this condition for a long time, he asked him, "Do you want to get well?" "Sir," the invalid replied, "I have no one to help me into the pool when the water is stirred. While I am trying to get in, someone else goes down ahead of me." Then Jesus said to him, "Get up! Pick up your mat and walk." At once the man was cured; he picked up his mat and walked. The day on which this took place was a Sabbath, and so the Jews said to the man who had been healed, "It is the Sabbath; the law forbids you to carry your mat." But he replied, "The man who made me well said to me, 'Pick up your mat and walk.' " So they asked him, "Who is this fellow who told you to pick it up and walk?" The man who was healed had no idea who it was, for Jesus had slipped away into the crowd that was there. Later Jesus found him at the temple and said to him, "See, you are well again. Stop sinning or something worse may happen to you." The man went away and told the Jews that it was Jesus who had made him well.

Jesus doesn't asks what kind of shoes we wear, clothing, what color is our hair... No, He clearly tells us each day what we should do, how to follow him. He doesn't needs excuses like : I'm weak, I don't know how to talk, I'm shy... He will provide anything that we need to fulfill His will in us. He will abnormally bless you if you are willing to fallow Him trough anything. He speaks to you in many many ways, if you listen, and don't make excuses, He will lead you to many blessings in your life.


In meanwhile, there was a tribune. The main point was to make our daily life a mission. Not the mission as people take it in way that you send someone in foreign country and never see him/her again, or it is not a job of preachers or pastor or people on that kind of positions. Mission is our relationship with God, in doing His will. It is based on commandment : Go and make all people my disciples. But it is bigger than only this. Your whole lifestyle should be centered on doing Gods will in your life, thinking of Him, praying to Him, praise Him , obey Him each an every second of your life. Real ministry is living with God, showing others in our life who is Christ and what He did in us and for us, telling them our testimony, praying for them... Living for God is the only way of doing real ministry, without Him we can talk in empty, like talking to wall or something like it. Without God we are nothing.
I wanna ask you something. Are you ready today to stand up, and raise your voice to God telling Him you will live for Him each day and second, that you will go and speak up about Him not being ashamed of it? Are you ready to move from you well-known place and shelter to go outside in world and talk about God? If you decide so, know He will be with you, bless you, because you are doing His will.

May God bless you all a lot.
Dorotea Santo