Wonderful day yesterday…. I didn’t go far, as dear Bjorn & Maria invited half of Borås to their home, it seemed! They have a WONDERUL ministry of loving people (shouldn’t we ALL have that? Don’t think a lot do!), and genuinely caring for them with a longing to see them healed and whole, even some who turned up yesterday – with others – whom they didn’t know! Their house is like Piccadilly Circus at rush hour, at times, yet they embrace everyone, find ‘fika’ (the lovely informal sandwich/salad’scones/waffles’ tea that is much par of Swedish life. I don’t know that I know many people with bigger, more generous hearts than them. Thank you, Bjorn, Maria: your wonderful. And Kristin, Filip, and John – you’re every bit a part of the love in this home, much bigger than you’d ever know, and such a blessing to me…

Thursday, Phillip and his best friend Adam, both youth pastors, took this old git out to lunch: both cool, trendy eligible young man with a near-pension-age Cockney in tow. Had a lovely time with them, and then, bless ’em, they prayed for my knees on the steps of the church opposite, very public, and they have been noticeably better….bless you both!

Yesterday, chill-out morning after the late night in Gothenburg (no, it’s NOT where Batman lives!!! That’s Gotham). A lovely lunch with Bjorn, such a dear, close friend, even with the ‘blocks of absence’ in our friendship with my not being in Sweden. B & M’s friendship is one of those you pick up beyond where you left off last time.

Then – the human tsunami. I’m not mentioning names here, as some were Maria’s colleagues from school, and some are Christians-in-waiting. Another aside – hilarious, not just to me (as my pension from the NatWest Bank – £10 a week at 65 – would never be beaten for ‘lowness’!!) – Maria was notified of a pension from some place she worked a couple of days ago. It’s massive!!!! At 65, she gets 3 Crowns (Kronor) a month, reducing to 1 Crown at 70 years old…. so that’s about 28 pence a month for 5 years, then reducing to 9 pence a month!!

I have no idea how many passed through the house from 4-8 pm: I didn’t know any were ‘in waiting’! but it wouldn’t have changed the way I’d prayed, anyway… no spectacular miracles, but I think just about everyone experienced the awesome peace of God, heat, tingling, electricity going through them, some with pain reducing (of course, that will continue). B, M, and I all knew that God did stuff they didn’t tell us about – maybe didn’t even realise, weren’t aware of….so, in process are things like a new thyroid where the old one had already been removed, arthritis (knees, yep!!!) having more flexibility and no pain when standing (after sitting a long time – I know that one!!)… I could list all the ‘usual’ stuff from previous blogs, but want those lovely folk to retain their hidden identity – until THEY choose to talk about it.

All of the people felt the Presence of God in the house, and when He’s somewhere, you don’t have pray too much, ‘cos ‘nobody does it better’…. (cue song?)….

Some of the folk seemed totally bowled over by the way I pray…. 🙂 …. with humour, and conversation all in the middle of it….! Sort of knocks not-yet-Christian people’s view of stuffy, unknown religious word prayers, on the head! And I was wearing my Shakespeare t-shirt – can’t understand why people think it’s funny, it’s from ‘Much ado about nothing’ – ‘He hath an excellent stomach’….!!!!! Some of them thought it was brilliant…. maybe we ought to let people see us laughing at ourselves more often….?

And then, yet another privilege: last Tuesday I had the joy of speaking in the Pentecostal Church here. The Pastor, Urban, is a delightful man: I loved praying with him. He has a brother in law, Paul, who was, for much of his life, a missionary in Bolivia and Argentina. I couldn’t physically get to pray for him, as he lives in Jönköping. He had to come home to Sweden as cancer was diagnosed, pretty rampant extreme cancer too: prostate, spread quickly to his skeletal frame. So Maria phoned him yesterday, and – what a delightful, wonderful man… as someone with a raging love for South America, it was so lovely to connect with someone here with an even greater passion than me for that great continent. We chatte in and out of English and Spanish, and prayed for each other in Spanish. This man is not ready for that foul disease to take him: I felt as I prayed for him that he’d have years ahead back there, and that one day, with my lovely friends Hendrik & Teija Hoere, from Cali – who are also passionate about Bolivia – that we’d all meet there and bring heaven to earth, and Bolivia transformed…

Then, an extra blessing… a lovely friend, from 7 years back, Pierre, and I went out to eat, and catch up with each other. It was so, so good.

By the way, the picture isn’t what Bjorn & Maria USUALLY look like… they’re just a lot of fun, and crazy, which – like with Vello and Ingalill, and Stojan, last week, is why I get on with them…. 🙂