Over recent months I have found myself reflecting again on how I have changed in my thinking, understanding and journey as a Christian believer. I can look back and see how from those early days as a young teenage Christian within a local Anglican church, I have been on a faith journey right through to where I am now as a Christian within the Baptist family and engaged in a form of ministry I had never imagined myself doing. There have been times of sincere and confident acceptance of the very heart and truth of the Gospel and times when I have been confronted with doubts. There have been life experiences that have led me to the brink of despair whilst other moments have been ones of great joy and delight. This for me is living the life of a Christian, life in all its fullness, with an assurance that somehow God has been, and still is, engaged with me on the journey.

In the last couple of years I have moved again in my own journey as I have re-discovered a spirituality that at times had been lost when faced with desert-like dry spells, wilderness wanderings or even Christian/church busyness. How easy it is for any of us to begin to think that the focus of Christian living is 'me', we even seek God's blessing on my life, my church, my ministry and somehow God is pushed to the outer boundary of our experience. In reflecting on scripture lately around the theme of Pentecost and the work of the Holy Spirit, I have found myself contemplating the theme of 'fullness'. I had always considered that God filling me with the Spirit was the key but I have found that I need something more, for me it is my journey into the fullness of who God is. To rest in God and to long after God has become so precious for me. The song based on Psalm 42 says 'as the deer pants for the water so my soul longs after you'. The water was vital for the deer to survive, so my life is completely dependent on an experience of God which takes me deeper into the very nature and heart of who God is.

My longing for each of us as God's children and for all those who count themselves part of the Church of Jesus is that we all, in our own particular way and journey, might discover something fresh and new in our walk with God.

May you draw closer to God and find yourself immersed in Him.

Andrew Millns