Midget Gems

Like lots of people I used to ask God to speak to me, show himself to me, but I didn't recognise that actually He WAS talking to me, I just didn't know how to listen. I questioned my faith, wondered if He really was there for me. Was St Thomas' the right place to be? I was beginning to believe it wasn't. Then one day, a bad day, I was praying as usual as I walked down to church. 'Is this the place for me Lord, should I be here, they don't do the things I like here Lord, I'm really not happy with all that hugging, and those songs! Should I go somewhere else?' I walked into the entrance and a lorry ran over me, or at least that's how it felt. The walls were purple. Purple. He was speaking to ME! I walked into church and sat down, not in my usual place, just a couple of rows further forward and near the centre of the aisle. Someone held a roll of wallpaper up, and told us about this song we were going to sing - 'I am a new creation'. A voice boomed out at me, and I had to look round and see if everyone else was hearing it. I can't remember the exact words (with time things like that fade don't they?), but something like 'You're home, you're here, this is where you belong'. I remember crying my way through most of that service, but no-one seemed to notice. God had actually spoken, used words, to ME! Not only that, He had painted the walls purple, just like they were in my childhood church, where I had felt at home, secure and close to God.

What's that got to do with midget gems? Well, it's 6.30 in the morning. At around 5.30 this morning, October 15th 2005, God gave me a picture. He spoke to me again. These days I can usually tell when God speaks to me, in fact just recently I seem to have a personal line right to Him. Sometimes it's just something someone says or does, sometimes it's a feeling inside, sometimes I don't even know about it, I just say something to someone and they tell me later what I've said. I've only had the voice once more since my purple moment. This morning I woke with the midget gems. Those of you who know me well, will know that I can hear them calling me and saying eat me - yes, I am rather partial to them. But what have they gone and done? Got rid of the blacks! Put purples in instead. I like those, but they're not the same as the blacks. BUT, what do I do? Should I give up buying them altogether just because there's no blacks? I could get poor bens as well.

This is what God told me this morning. Sometimes when we come to church, we want the blacks. We want what WE like….it might be traditional hymns or a Duggie song to a cd, it might be David speaking or Jean leading the prayers. Whatever it is, it's what WE want. Problem is, the person sitting next to me doesn't like these things, they like Jeanette to speak or to listen to the music group sing, or watch the puppets. So, how can we both be 100% satisfied? We can't. It's as simple as that. We have to compromise. Really it's not that often that we have to eat the greens (I don't like greens), so don't chuck them out, chew them with grace. They might be someone else's favourite. We can eat the reds and the oranges, and even the purples. They're ok, not our favourite, but someone else's favourite. Just occasionally we can have the blacks.

When it comes to the important stuff, singing praises to God, worshipping Him, talking to Him, then God wants us to eat the whole bag. The greens and the blacks, and all the others in between. That's how we get a good mix and learn about stuff we didn't even realise we were interested in. It's how we learn to love one another and do things for each other. Respect our differences. We sacrifice our blacks for their greens. WE ARE MIDGET GEMS!