Coming down the mountain

I have just sent this out in email form to all our supporters but rather than a massive rewrite I thought I would post it here as well...

Sorry for it's length......

Urgent prayer
Brian has been charged with operating an illegal taxi! A drunk guy we took home told the police he had paid for our services, which just wasn’t true. This is very stressful and we are currently trying, with the help of a solicitor, to convince the local council that we do not charge for what we do. If the truth does not prevail we will end up having to pay a 6000 euro fine, or Brian will be asked to leave Ibiza and not allowed back for 5 years! We could really do with your prayers on this one.

The farm and the future
This is a time of transition for us as a community. Many of you were excited with us when we shared our news about the farm last year; we want to update you thoroughly on that, so the next bit is quite long!

After much deliberation, prayer and stress we have decided to leave the farm. There have been many contributing factors…..

Brian and Tracy have craved a sense of family space and feel that it is increasingly important as the boys enter adolescence. The layout of the farmhouse does not lend itself to this.

Bruce would much prefer to be close to San Antonio to facilitate developing relationships with people who live here all year round.

Helen will not be here for the winter; after faithfully honouring her initial 3 year commitment to the work here, she will being going on a 5/6 month furlough back to Germany. Please add your prayers to hers as she asks God to show her whether to return to Ibiza at the end of that time.

All of us need to live in a place that feels like home – although we have tried hard, we acknowledge that the farm has not been that for any of us.

We have recognized that we do not have enough people here to realize the dreams that we had of offering a place of refuge and respite in addition to the rest of our work. Although we have been able to use the farm as a place of hospitality, there is not anything that we have done here that we would not have been able to offer if we had been living as we did previously.

We have not found that living here enhances the work that we are already doing; in reality it could even detract with the additional work that is involved in looking after the property and basic amenities. ‘Living simply’ is hard work!

The lack of a telephone has been a major factor in making us feel disconnected from relationships with our family and friends who are not in Ibiza and this has been a big struggle.

Although the tranquillity and beauty of the location has been incredible, we all feel that friendships and connections with residents would be improved by being less remote. This is also relevant to Ellis and Dan as they are now old enough to begin to go out independently.

It has been a hard decision; we all felt so sure that God had brought us to this place and people got behind us and supported us financially. We have learned a lot and with the decision to move made, have started to focus on the future here again.

We have struggled with questions. Did we make a mistake in moving? Was there something that God wanted us to do here that we haven’t been able to do? But we are clear that we cannot continue to live here in the same way and have come to a place of peace with God about that.

What next?

Brian and Tracy particularly have struggled with a sense of guilt and responsibility for ‘walking away’ from the farm, especially with the awareness of people who dreamed with us and generously gave to help to make this happen. Those of you that we have already spoken to have been very gracious and affirming in your support for us and the work, which has been a huge relief. We are now looking for a family home.

Bruce will need to find accommodation. This will mean either living alone or lodging/house sharing with others.

Helen will drive her car back to Germany. Someone very generously blessed Brian and Tracy with a new vehicle this year and they have passed on their previous car to Bruce; this will mean an extra financial challenge for him in insurance and general maintenance costs.

We have come through a tough year, a little weary, but with a growing optimism for the work of 24-7 Ibiza. We feel there is more still to be done here in both summer and winter and have not arrived at a ‘plateau’.

When we decided to leave the farm a wise friend said this to us “Little about God's movements and directions in our lives are about the "ministry" itself and more about character and relational strength - that is the Long Term nature of God's dealings in the immediate time and space. The call of God to the farm was the call of God, you were obedient, but you may have thought it was about expanding the ministry when in reality it was about bringing your team together, readjusting the focus of your vision for Ibiza and showing you the sanctity of having a more private family life - a lot of idealism gets punctured in this process, some pain and tons of fruit will come from it.”


Thank you once again for your love, prayers and support.

pears

We harvested about 300 pears today and about 200 onions. The next question is what am I going to do with them? We'll give as many pears away as possible, but I am wondering how easy it would be to make pear brandy???

The onions will be easier, we can freeze, pickle and store them.

We have our 3rd team of 9 people with us and tonight is their first night out on the street, hope it goes well for them.

I was out last night with Christine, we got a call at about 2am, ended up getting back at about 5am. This isn't a great story but on one level I have to tell you our failures, well maybe not even failures, just tough ones. We met this guy he had fallen asleep in a bar and the owners had phoned us to come and help him home, they where really helpful giving him water etc.. but he wouldn't go, he just kept telling us to "f**k off" but we couldn't because his wallet kept falling out of his pocket and he was going to get robbed. We kept tucking it back in and eventually made it secure but we then saw another guy who had been punched in the face in a bar and the shock of it had caused him to vomit. We left the f**k off guy sitting by a wall and went to help this young lad. he could only have been 17 and his mate was completely sober. We got them home to their hotel ok, just gets to me sometimes when these guys are only about 4 years older than my son. What a great night out a fat lip and shirt covered in puke!!! We went back to find the other guy but he had gone......

The farm is such a lovely respite from the madness and we are so blessed to be here. The evening breezes are a life saver.

How to motivate chickens

U2 were good, just good, obviously their back catalogue is fantastic so almost anything they play has instant resonation therefore causing you to get into it, but to me they looked a little bit rusty and it almost felt like a rehearsal. The revolving drum kit was the only way Larry could stay in touch with the whole crowd but occasionally this meant he was out of touch with Bono and this lead to one or two moments where the band seemed disconnected. I wonder whether they work better with an English speaking audience?

We where very close to the front and the atmosphere was fantastic the nou camp was full, Snow Patrol were brilliant, tight, energetic and a great opening band, for Tracy and I it felt like a double header.

I am also now the proud owner of a lovely Freelander, getting up our hill has never been easier. The car is fantastic. I had no problems meeting Jude and Owen in Barcelona, we had a lovely evening meal together and then on the Thursday I spent the entire day on the Barcelona Ibiza ferry, a little boring, but worth it just to get the car over.

Thank you to everyone who contributed to getting the car over and also to all you lovely people who offered to drive over for me.

Got a busy week ahead, need to harvest all our potatoes and onions, plus the pear tree needs de-pearing. We will give the pears out in centre this week. Our grapes are looking good but they are not ready yet, got to get more water on them. It's a definite farm week this week. On top of the harvesting got to make a gate, sort out a way of killing the rats in the hay barn and stopping the sparrows from getting in to the chicken coup to steal all the food. I am thinking about shooting them, but ricochets around a barn could be deadly. We are also trying to work out a way to discover which chickens aren't laying when we discover who the slackers are, they are going in the pot!

In all honesty I think killing one would incentivize the rest to get back up to speed, there is nothing like the death of a team mate for laziness to motivate you to work that little bit harder.

breaking the ground

This is a picture of me with my favourite piece of farm machinery, my rotavator!!!! It's a back breaker and a shoulder maker. This photo almost makes it look gentile but it's not!!!

In many ways this is what i feel happens when we pray, we break up the ground, we prepare the land, we clear the weeds, we make way for growth.

It's hard work and you have to keep at it, most weeds don't go away just by being dug over, you need to clear the roots, the same goes for prayer.

It's hard work and you have to keep at it, sometimes it's going well and you then hit the occasional rock which flings you about, but if you keep digging and preparing the ground eventually you will have a healthy fertile patch of land in which you can plant seed in. Then the rest is down to God although for a further analogy the seed won't grow if it's not watered and weeds aren't pulled up from around it. I guess I'm feeling that it's ok to sow seeds of prayer but we have to keep praying until the land bears fruit.

Breaking the ground is just the beginning.

Heres our little summer long crew, these guys have come to serve for the summer and they are great.

The girls will hate this photo, but from left to right we have Clare Ison, Christine Scott, Me and James Godward. They are really making life much easier up here on the farm and they are all brilliant when it comes to the centre and the streets.

Clare is from near coventry and will be having a little break in the middle and then rejoining us until September, Christine is a nurse from N.Ireland who has taken a 6 month career break to be with us from May till October and James is here until August.

Weirdly James dad used to be my youth leader. I remember he took us all out as a youth group to Basildon when I was about 15, we were going home and one of our guys mouthed off to a drunk guy this guy thought it was me, chased me, pulled a knife on me and stabbed me in the head!!!! Russell, Jame's dad, saw it all, I can still remember him saying to the guy who pulled the knife "that isn't going to get you any where mate!" it wasn't a severe stabbing, he backed me into a corner, I banged my head on a wall, and as I jumped away from the wall his knife just clipped me in the temple! He looked more freaked out than me, so he ran off.

This was 1985, my stabber had a mullet.....

Anyway it's lovely to have all these guys here, they are a real asset.

Help my steering has gone!!!

My Audi A4 used to look like this way back in 1996 when it was made!!! Now my little baby has done over 200,000 miles, the paint is faded, the aircon has become irreparable after numerous re gasses!! and this week Tracy was taking the boys to school when the steering went!! So we are without a car!! and it will take the garage here a week to even tell us the damage and the cost for repairs. By the way Tracy and the boys were fine, it just ground to a halt on a safe bit of road at the bottom of our track....

Like an old pet I think it is time to get rid of my car before it becomes a money pit. We do over 250 miles a week in it which includes school runs, shopping, going to into the westend, football training, bringing people up to the farm all of that, it's generally a great family car. But it has to go, I didn't ever imagine you could be sentimental about a car but I am about this one as it is the car we drove to Ibiza with and now it's going to die of old age on the island. Maybe thats prophetic!

The main reason, other than age and mileage, for getting rid of it is that it can't handle our farm track anymore, we need something more robust.

Having done some research, this is what we are looking for it's a Land Rover Freelander TD4 ES on the 2001/2002 plate with manual transmission and diesel engine. The reason for 2001/2002 is that it had a new more robust engine put in that year by BMW. I'm being quite specific although if someone sees one with a better spec at a good price I would be happy to give it a look. I really don't want to go more than £4000.

The main reason I want to buy in the UK is that the same spec car here in Ibiza would be about 11,000 euros, which is roughly £10,000!!! it makes sense financially to get it in the UK.

You can help me by reading below





1. If you're the praying type a little prayer in the right direction would be a great help, this has become a very pressing need.

2. If your the giving type and feel you want to help us as a family in this way, please hit the donate button or contact me direct, especially if you are in the UK as by going direct we can do gift aid.

3. If you know of anyone who has one of these cars for sale could you let me know.

4. If you have a spare one lying around that you aren't using, I'd be happy to take it off your hands and give it a good home!

5. When the vehicle is purchased I will need some help and a few willing bodies to drive it to Ibiza from the UK, so if you fancy a road trip let me know.

Hope you don't mind me sharing my needs, people have been such a help in the past. This is the price of farm living, I'm not complaining or stressed, feel very calm but I need your help.

Eggs

I know a lot of people live this way but I was very excited to eat my boiled egg this morning. The reason being that on Tuesday we got 6 chickens!!!! I stole the pic from helens blog, by the way we have discovered chickens don't like onions. They are doing ok when you move chickens it takes them a little while to start laying again so yesterday we only got two eggs, and I have eaten one. I don't think we will give the birds names, they are not pets.

They seem quite happy mincing about in their home, I have to get some fencing so that they can have an outdoor run, however the outbuilding they are in right now is very large and they have loads of space and lots of sunlight. The problem with the fencing is that I have to make it dog proof, my dog wants to eat the chickens and I don't think I can train it out of him. So I need to raise about 300 euros to get a good fence!!!!

We also have Clare and Christine with us who have joined to help us for the summer, Christine is here for 6 months and Clare is here for two months, our household has got larger which is fun. The girls went out on the street with Tracy and Bruce last night, they had a good time, it's still very quiet, but good conversations are being had.

I like this quote by C.S.Lewis “It may be hard for an egg to turn into a bird: it would be a jolly sight harder for it to learn to fly while remaining an egg. We are like eggs at present. And you cannot go on indefinitely being just an ordinary, decent egg. We must be hatched or go bad.”

My egg tasted fantastic, much bigger than a supermarket egg, and no writing on the side.

First team

We have a team out at the moment they came yesterday and we are all working on the farm today.

We start in the westend next Monday night!!!!

Very busy today.

This is a first I am blogging whilst on the toilet..........

More later

The Simple way

The church I used to be the leader of in Diss has a really great project that uses their building, it's called Kadesh, it's an inclusion project for children who have difficullties adjusting to school.

They have just got a little farm and i am very envious of their live stock initiatives, they have pigs, goats and chickens. Check out their blog and see how it's all going at Kadesh Community Farm I really do love how there are a lot of projects out there that are engaging with the land.

Andrew Jones has recently visited a farm project with his family in Portugal, these guys look hard core and look a lot more like hippies than us check out Shanti Pilgrim they do things with dirt and growing stuff.

Maybe this is the way forward, during this financial crisis people will look at ways of becoming much more self sustainable. In the UK allotments are on the increase, these are small pieces of public land given over to members of the public for a small fee where by they can grow some vegetables. In 2008 The Guardian reported that 330 000 people held an allotment, whilst 100,000 were on waiting lists.

I also love the work of Shane Claiborne and the guys at the Simple Way I love the fact that they are choosing to engage with the world in a different way.

Within our movement 24-7 prayer I think we will see a lot more boiler rooms start to get productive with growing their own food and developing models of sustainable living.

I'm not a hippy, but I love the challenges of a simple life. Our potatoes and onions are coming along brilliantly, as well as our lettuce, spinach and carrots. We have lost a few other crops but it's all part of learning. We'll probably get some livestock after the summer as our lives will get extremely busy from next week!!!

I am also very inspired by the Kadesh guys who are using simple techniques of looking after animals to help young people become more gentle and engage with the world in a better way.

Our Garden

I'm missing the farm, this photo was taken from our land, we where right on the edge and thats the farm in the middle.

Hopefully it gives you an idea of scale that we are dealing with!!!

Simple living

Phil Togwell and family where out with us last week and he has written a great little report on his visit, check it out here.

We don't actually have a well, we have a cistern that fills up rain water, it's all very clean and filtered and actually very soft water. The problem is it doesn't rain very much here, so last week we ran out of water. This was not a total disaster as you just get a lorry to bring you 10,000 litres up the hill to put in your cistern for about 80 euros.

This has made us all think about our water use, something I would imagine most people in the western world don't have to think about much. We have checked a few things out and found that just running the tap for the dishes waiting for the water to get hot wastes 4 litres, like wise for a shower. So on any given day we waste a minimum of 30 litres!

It's a similar situation with electricity, if you run a washing machine at night you deplete your solar batteries, if you leave an electrical item on standby you deplete the battery, forget to switch a light off and you further deplete the battery. When the battery gets depleted we then kick over to a petrol generator which isn't very eco friendly, this recharges the batteries.

It's almost like we have become reluctant energy and water conservers, we are totally not used to living this way it is good for us but can also be a little stressful. We could end up easily getting through 10'000 litres of water every two or three weeks and the generator costs about 500 euros to put 680 litres of fuel in.

Yet we do live in the western world and this isn't Africa I am catching a very small glimpse of what it must be like to have no water, but I can always just phone for a lorry!

To be honest I am becoming more eco conscious not solely because of the environment but because of the cost!

I am westernised and as far as I am concerned, on a convenience level, simple living sucks!!! but I am stuck with it and having to embrace it, which is good. I'm not a hippy although I would love a kaftan

Packaged food

The idea that our food was once an animal is often difficult to get our heads around. We sort of know it but the reality is that most of us eat packaged meat, me included. I don't often think about all the killing that goes on to provide us with a nice roast dinner.

Well tonight I shot my first Rabbit, a good clean shot, then a quick neck break just to make sure it was dead.

Robb and Sally thanks for the sight. I have practiced much and tonight when it mattered it was "hasta la vista bunny"

Heres the evidence




I don't feel very deep at the moment, my previous post was rubbish, I'll just stick to a bit of reportage until the juices flow again.

Weekends work

I plowed my first field this weekend, sorry no photographs. I will post some soon.

Due to the kindness of my blog readers we were able to buy a rotivator, it's a back breaker and a shoulder maker. I have felt like I have done a 4 hour upper body workout. The biggest thing is that it tries to run ahead of you and you need to hold it back as it churns up the land, this is easier said than done. Stones are another problem the blades chuck stones out which can kill the shins and it will also leap in the air if it hits a big one, you end up with this 60 kilo machine bucking in the air. All good fun.

Bruce cranked up the bread oven over the weekend, check out his photos. I asked Pepe our landlord how old the bread oven was and he said "older than us". We are enjoying getting this place working again.

We talked to our land ladies mother and asked her about the house. It is the oldest house in Benimussa and was built by the Moors (Arabs) over 500 years ago. It then fell into the hands of the Serra family, who where very religious. This house became renowned in the area as a place you could come if you needed food or somewhere to sleep for the night. She also said "they prayed to much" they where always praying. During the civil war they provided refuge for 10 people on the run from the army and hid them in caves in our hills for months, sending a donkey up with food. They would often let people sleep in their hay barn and had massive fiestas up in these hills where they fed many people.

So the history of this house is that it was a place of hospitality and prayer, how weird is that.

We are off to buy some potatoes this morning to plant in our fields, then I need to put some fences up around the plowed land before we plant anything else, as the rabbits will try to eat everything. I nearly shot one on Saturday I fired a round off and missed, it ran under a bush, I followed it, couldn't find it, then I noticed it moving, it was 3 feet away, I panicked and shot from the hip, totally missing it, then it ran off to safety.

It's probably going to eat all my lettuce in revenge.

This is my favourite job, wood splitting. My friend Sally took these photos I think they are great.

It's been a good week here on the farm, my best yet. I think the temptation is to run away with loads of ideas and dreams for the place, which are necessary and good, without first building a proper rhythm.

The words of the week for me are foundations and perseverance.

We've got to persevere but also we need to lay good foundations, without feeling the pressure of instantly needing to deliver a full on farm program. I checked yesterday and so far just through this blog there has been over £2000 from the donate button towards the move, which is absolutely fantastic. Thank you for giving, words can't really express how humbling it is to be help in this way.




Back to foundations, someone once gave me a great piece of advice "don't let other people live out their dreams through you" this hasn't happened yet but you do occasionally in life meet people who have lots of suggestions about what you should do and how you should use what you have been given, without any willingness to do it themselves.

Of course take advice, listen to counsel, implement wise suggestions, always be open to mature direction and correction, but always remember your own calling and God's specific task for you. Thats what I am learning.

In leadership you will get people who want authority without responsibility, you can't have authority without responsibility. People who sometimes just want to sit in an advisory role can want authority without responsibility, or even people without a role always want to tell you what you should do without actually wanting to do it themselves. Just thoughts.

The wood looks great once it is split. Thank you for journeying with me.

It's worth it

We are a few weeks in now.

What am I learning.

1. Sometimes you don't realise how much you appreciate things until you don't have them.

2. Other timers time you realise you had things in your life that you don't really need.

3. Haven! an interesting word. Your home is your haven that place where you go and escape to completely be yourself, once you share your home with others that sense of haven takes a while to be restored.

4. Sharing a house with people is completely different than having people stay in your house.

5. I don't miss television.

6. I am enjoying limited internet access.

7. I miss the telephone, I prefer to hear peoples voices over email.

8. Grace

9. Rabbits are tricky little things to shoot. I have shot at 6 rabbits and missed them all.

10. You have to ensure you don't lose a sense of family, we have created a family space in our large bedroom to watch DVD's and play games or just read.

11. Wood cutting at 4pm on a sunny day will result in mosquito bites. I had 20 bites plus sunburn.

12. I am better with an axe than a chainsaw.

13. Realistically moving here has been as tough as leaving England to move to Ibiza.

14. It's worth it.

15. To stop smoke blowing down your woodburner you need to keep your fire very hot.

16. Lemon trees and pomegranate trees have thorns.

17. Community living as an ideal sounds wonderful, community living in reality takes hard work.

18. It's worth it.

19. Growth is being forced upon me and I am happy with that.

20. Pushing a wheel barrow up a hill is good for the heart, being dragged down the hill by it filled with wood is bad for the back.

21. This place will be great for so many people on so many levels.

22. It's worth it.

Brief update

I stole the photo's from Brian Houston I think it's one of my friendlier poses. It's been hard but fulfilling work, no more need for the gym or jogging, wood cutting is the way forward. I am Axe man! and I have started calling Bruce chain boy because of his expertise with a chainsaw, although he thinks I should stop calling him that as it sounds a little weird.

Still no internet, I am down at our centre and have just been getting emails but for some reason I can't reply to them from here. The guy is coming to install the internet tomorrow morning which should be great, it will be a few more weeks before we have a phone because telefonica are basically the worst telephone company in the world.

I was 39 yesterday and thank you to everyone who left a message, one more year until 40, we had steaks and wine last night of course we had vegetables and other bits and pieces but the steak and wine made it perfect, plus the single malt whiskey and Monte Cristo number 4!.

I've been sleeping well probably because pushing a wheel barrow up and down a hill is pretty close to fatal exercise but it's good for the heart.

It's been uber windy, which is great for fire wood but not so great for chimney smoke...

Anyway the views are fantastic this one is from just outside our front door......




If you have emailed me in the last few weeks and are awaiting a reply, it will come soon.

Internet Cafe

I am not enjoying the internet cafe experience, but here I am with a quick post!

The move has gone well, we are now living surrounded by boxes, but that is okay.

The electricity stopped working on Friday for 2 hours just as it was getting dark, Tracy got it sorted with our land lady in the end, there are a few teething problems. We have no hot water, which is okay for me but for the girls who have hair, it is really cold. Hopefully it will be fixed today. We should get internet by Thursday, but this is Spain.

Wood chopping is fun, thankfully someone bought us the chainsaw so we are making it happen big style. Don't worry we are not chopping down trees just cutting up the wood that has fallen over. With half a million square metres of land we have loads of fallen to keep us going.

Nearly shot a rabbit the other day, Bruce, the boys and I have got shots of at 6 in total but we have missed every time. Don't worry our day will come.

We have the kitchen sorted it's the only room with heating at the minute, and we have a few mice, nothing traps won't sort out.

The landladies husband is showing me how to prune our vines this week, he has already shown me how to do the pomegranates and fig tree.

The boys are happy and so is Tracy, we are just ploughing on.

Anyway I need to get back and cut wood......

keep praying

Next week

I'm going to make an advance apology for a lack of blogging.

We are moving to the farm on Wednesday, it's going to be a very busy week. Thankfully we have some friends from Northern Ireland coming out to help us, Stevie Smyth the leader of Northdown CFC, Chris Mahood our good friend who was with us in the summer and Brian Houston, no not the leader of Hillsongs but the excellent singer song writer from the emerald isle.

We have a lot of pressing needs, here they are in order of priority if you could help it would be great don't stress if you can't give, if your the praying kind please pray.

1. Internet connection: due to the remote location, we need a special system. As you are aware, a large amount of our work involves the co-ordination and running of teams; the internet is essential for making this happen. This will cost 1200 euros.

2. The property is 200 years old! We need one central wood burner which will heat the rest of the house; we are surrounded by forest, so once it is installed, there will be no further heating costs. Wood burner, cost and installation is 850 euros.

3. With the need for a large amount of wood we will need a chainsaw. This would cost 150 euros

4. Again, due to the remote nature of our property we will need a separate telephone line antenna which will cost 120 euros

5. In order that we can work the land and have enough equipment for others to work the land with us, we will need a selection of farming tools; these will cost in the region of 200 euros.

6. Although we will not become full time farmers, we would like to cultivate several of the fields; to do this effectively, we would need a reasonably hard core rotavator; this will cost 600 euros.

We are looking to raise 3200 euros very quickly. At this present time one euro equals one pound, scary......

Remember this isn't to fund Brians dream of living in the country but God's dream of having a place of respite, prayer and care here on the island.

If you have hope rather than fear in todays present financial climate please hit the donate button.

Please remember us this week......

Getting ready

We have had a fantastic Christmas, it's just been the 4 of us and it's been a great family time. There are a few things you need to have if you are going to be moving onto a farm. My family bought me this lovely high powered air rifle, which will be good for keeping the vermin at bay and hopefully bag us a few rabbits for the pot. It's a gamo shadow 1000, only a 177 but it has a longer range than a 22, and a velocity of 1000 feet per second, very nice.

I also got a great t-shirt which I am wearing in the photo and a gorgeous single malt which I am drinking as I write......



The other thing you have to do is learn stuff to do with food, in October Tracy picked all these olives off our small tree in the front garden it's been a great test run for what promises to be a much larger harvest next year.



We've learnt a few things from this batch probably the most important thing is that you have to pick them just at the right time, we were a little early, but what is done is done. They actually take quite a while to prepare for eating this batch has taken two months. They are very edible we put some of my home grown chillies and a number of cloves of garlic in with this batch and they taste great. We'll make oil from them next year as well.

We have the keys to the farm and move in on 14th January..................scary

He's in the whispers

He wasn't in the fire, He wasn't in the quake, He's in the whispers.... I love this line from Bluetrees song God's noise. Sometimes I want to hear God in a loud clear voice but he's in the whispers. To hear the whispers I need to be still and quiet and I find that hard at the moment.

One of my greatness hindrances to listening is the noise in my head, it distracts me, it runs like a tape in the background constantly throwing out hundreds of questions and random thoughts.

At the moment my head is fried, the challenges we face are large. It's great to post some lovely photo's of the farm but getting up there is a challenge. We need to get our deposit back from our landlady which could be difficult. We need to raise money for relocation costs, we could do with 10,000 euros in the next month which is a little stressy. Alongside that our personal support has taken a major hit because of the pound against the euro, we get the majority of our money in pounds and the exchange rate is pants. December is not an easy time to get an increase in support or raise money for our mountain move. In the midst of all this it's easy to focus on these things and allow them to dominate your thinking, of course you have to be realistic but at the same time I know we are called to be here and that through the gentle whisper of God we are being led up the mountain. I have found that if God wants you to be somewhere he requires you to step out with wisdom and faith and then he tends to honour that step.

My father sent me an email this morning which said "God honours faith for faith honours Him" I like that and it encourages me greatly.

I'm going to get still and listen for the whispers...........