I (Janet) wanted to share a little about what happened last night 😃 We had mentioned in our blog at the end of May how we felt it important to gather a team together to pray for theonehundredyearsproject. This week we had our first gathering with that team and it was such a special time together. 🥳 We should have taken some photos of the gathering but weren’t sure whether that would be appropriate or not so we didn’t! Because it was the first time we’d all got together, Neil shared a bit about our journey to starting theonehundredyearsproject and why we were getting this group together to pray along the way.

Neil here, I’ll not lie, I actually found it quite hard to share about what we are doing in front of the group. It wasn’t them, it was me. We love all of these people, they are friends, they are supportive and kind. They also love what we are doing or they wouldn’t be there. It’s just that this was the first time I had ‘led’ a room in this way since the last ministry position I had which I had been in for around 17 years. I guess it brought some old things to the surface which is all part of the healing process! It also felt very personal to share some of what we needed prayer for and while I am an ‘open book’ in so many ways this did feel a little vulnerable for me. That said it was such a beautiful moment and as I already knew the prayer team were and are amazing! They are filled with faith for what the Lord wants to do in this area over the next hundred years, and they are major encouragers in our lives.

I (Janet) was so proud of Neil sharing, because I knew it was a vulnerable thing for him to do. It was so good! 🙌 The funny difference between the 2 of us is that I felt totally fine in what we were talking about etc, but at the end of the evening I felt a little embarrassed. The guys were amazing and I felt totally loved and invested in. But I worried that it could feel like we had invited them round for a night all about us which made me feel uncomfortable 😳 I knew that wasn’t the case, but I said it anyway just to be sure 😬 This is a bit of a vulnerable journey for Neil & I, and so I guess it’s going to take a bit of learning and practicing to get better at sharing our stuff along the way. I know that part of that comes from walking through some painful things in our past that, while we’re working hard at letting go of, can sometimes rear their heads again and try to pull us into worrying about what people will think and say about us. We know we can’t live in fear of that – and as I’ve said loads, we love and trust the people on our prayer team so this isn’t a reflection on them….I guess we just still have some healing and growing to do ❤️ We’re committed to the journey though ❤️🙌

Back to the actual night. As the team prayed, they shared words they felt God was giving them for us as a family, and for the direction of travel! It was sooooo encouraging! Afterwards as Neil and I were chatting about the evening, the best way we could think to describe what had happened was to say that they had lent us their courage to us to keep going the way we’re headed!!

We are designed in God’s image, and I believe part of what that means is that we are designed with community in mind. Simply put, in life, we all need each other ❤️ There are times in each of our lives when our courage wains a little and so we need good people around us to lend us their courage in those moments! As we’ve been starting out on this adventure of theonehundredyearsproject, while it’s been exciting, it’s also felt a bit wobbly at times! It can be tricky to always remember that because this is a God idea, it is a good idea! There have been times over the last few months, as we’ve shared before, when we’ve questioned if we’ve definitely heard from the Lord on how we’re taking this journey, and there have been moments among the excited times when we’ve felt a little lonely on this road. Don’t get me wrong, we are loving this!! And we are continually blown away by how God is leading us and loving us every step! But we are so pleased that God asked us to gather a prayer team at this moment, because we definitely need friends for the adventure 🙌

So last night was a really special, healing, hope filled and courage lending time for us, and one that we will cherish as we continue to adventure forward into all the Lord has called us to ❤️🥳🙌