Sutton Vineyard missional trip to Sri Lanka...

Sutton Vineyard, the church I go to, are hoping to send a team in the autumn to Sri Lanka.  Yesterday they had a day of prayer for the country, where violence is flairing again, and for the team itself.  I went along for an hour to pray - its  been a long time since I prayed for an hour and even longer since I've prayed for an hour on one theme.   I confess my mind wandered some of the time and I also prayed for some other people that I'm feeling a lot of compassion for at the mo, the heart doesn't have such rigid walls - but overall it was an awesone time...

One of the things that struck me in reading some of the provided history of Sri Lanka was the legacy of colonialism - Sri Lanka, then Ceylon,  was part of the British Empire and it was us Britains who brought in the minority Tamil's to work on the tea plantations.   After exploiting the country it is not surprising that a few short years after gaining independence the majority people were replicating the sins of colonialism on the minority Tamils.  It might be a post-colonial world for us in the west but how many former colonies around the world are still dealing with the fall out from the mistakes that we made?

One of the things that struck me was that this time, these people from Britain are not going out to lord it over the native population but to be servants to them - I was very much reminded of Jesus ' words:

"You've observed how godless rulers throw their weight around, how quickly a little power goes to their heads. It's not going to be that way with you. Whoever wants to be great must become a servant. Whoever wants to be first among you must be your slave. That is what the Son of Man has done: He came to serve, not be served—and then to give away his life in exchange for the many who are held hostage."

In other words the team is going out to bless and help, to be God's agents, amabasadors of reconciliation, bringers of peace and practical help - not to tell people how to live but to love and live with them for 10 days.

It won't undo by any means the damage caused by our colonial history but I'm praying that the humility, help and healing they can bring as they go will be part of the process that God uses to bring peace...