Does God Play Chess?
Dennis thinks God plays chess; he recently found himself ‘on the board’!
Some years back a thriving Czech church in a busy provincial city went through a disastrous split. Many people were spun off into oblivion and two fairly small groups continued as separate congregations, now in different denominations. The South Yorkshire gang (Dennis, Sue and folk from the churches there) became very much involved with one congregation, which grew, flourished and links very closely with all we do. There was no communication between the two Czech churches at any level. But both grew, with very different visions, but blessed of God. Click on the title to read more...
Some years back a thriving Czech church in a busy provincial city went through a disastrous split. Many people were spun off into oblivion and two fairly small groups continued as separate congregations, now in different denominations. The South Yorkshire gang (Dennis, Sue and folk from the churches there) became very much involved with one congregation, which grew, flourished and links very closely with all we do. There was no communication between the two Czech churches at any level. But both grew, with very different visions, but blessed of God.
A few months ago, Dennis was told that an old friend, Peter, was working in the Czech Republic. It was this friend who as a successful head of a Christian School encouraged the formation of the Barnsley Christian School in 1986 [www.barnsleychristianschool.org.uk/]. It turned out that he was working closely with a church not all that far away from the city in question; with a similar ministry to Dennis. Not only that, but he was deeply involved in a partnership with a Christian school that is being run by the ‘other’ church involved in the original split. (Getting confused? It gets worse – hold on!)
It just happened(!) that Dennis, Peter and his wife Elaine were in town the same weekend in early October. They had an evening together to chat over the situation. Dennis took his travelling companion, another Peter! It turned out that the wives of both Peters work together in the area of Pregnancy Crisis! (Someone is moving the chess pieces!)
Peter (the retired headmaster) was speaking for the first time in the ‘other’ church the next day and had been asked to speak on friendship and relationship, being a particularly close friend to the Pastor. Separately Dennis and Peter were able to speak to their ‘own’ men and the signs are looking good. We don’t expect the re-emergence of one congregation, but our God is so good at mending things that they end up better than when they started...especially chess pieces!
WATCH out for God’s move to Czechmate. We’ll keep you posted!
Dennis, Oct 2009