Christian perspective on the struggle of Life on Estates

Life on council estates is a Kingdom of STRUGGLE, but there is an alternative for you!

If you live on a council estate, the fact is, you are among the 13.5 million poorest and exploited of our unjust society. Your job prospects are rubbish, minimum wage, short term contracts if any at all, no rights whatsoever, no holiday pay, long hours, benefits that are complicated and meagre, it's almost impossible to build a descent life for yourself and your children - It's relentless and wrong and I hate it!

People should know, a lack of motivation to work is not necessarily a sign of laziness. The fact is, no-one really wants to do the jobs that are on offer because they are exploitative. People  are treated like spongers, not because they don't wanna work, but because they understanably don't want to be exploited. It's not the work in itself, it's the abusive nature of the work. Pressure to work through breaks, eyes on you all the time, worked like a dog for a pittance, basically, people are treated like crap. Why should anyone have to put up with it!

All this is bad enough, and although few may be able to get out of the poverty trap and exploitation, for most on estates, perhaps for you, life is marked by a big STRUGGLE on every front.

Raising children with no money - struggle.

Work - struggle

Paying bills - struggle

Poor food and clothes budget - struggle

Doing the shopping - struggle

Juggling work and child care - struggle

Unemployed? - struggle

Getting rubbish to the tip - struggle without a car

Running a car - struggle!

All this struggle is a result of sin. It ravages lives. Much of it is the sin of the selfish rich in exploiting the poor. 

Another Way

But this world we live in is not all there is! There is another community you can be part of, another 'Kingdom' that Jesus is establishing. You can be part of that. And as I once read somewhere, His Kingdom is not just pie in the sky when you die, but meat on your plate while you wait! Jesus' Kingdom is not just a promise for the future, but He makes a substantial difference now too.

Jesus alternative Kingdom began 2000 years ago, you can become part of it now. It is a kingdom of righteousness and justice, goodness, fairness, hope and grace. Most of all, entering that Kingdom means all your own guilt gets dealt with.

Yes, you are a victim of the system and you have been sinned against. But the truth is, you are not just a victim, others have been your victim. You have also 'sinned', think of all the people you have hurt in life - that's sin and you, like me and everyone else, need a new, fresh start, free of guilt. You may not feel like that but one day you will know it's true - because we will all give an account to God.

On that day, it would be the worst of tragedies if you - having been exploited by the rich in this life, then find you are shut out from God's kingdom for eternity because you never dealt with your own sin in this life.

That is why I live here in Moulsecoomb. I want the exploited of this world to at least know the hope, joy and promise of God's coming Kingdom and to begin entering now. No matter what your situation, and despite your very real STRUGGLE, you can know genuine peace, hope, strength, stability, purpose and meaning, forgiveness and freedom from guilt. These are what the Christian faith offer. Don't dismiss it out of hand. If you wanna know more - ask me! jrebera.nlc@gmail.com or 07534987583

Christian perspective on the struggle of 'Life on Estates'

Life on council estates is a Kingdom of STRUGGLE, but there is an alternative for you!

If you live on a council estate, the fact is, you are among the 13.5 million poorest and exploited of our unjust society. Your job prospects are rubbish, minimum wage, short term contracts if any at all, no rights whatsoever, no holiday pay, long hours, benefits that are complicated and meagre, it's almost impossible to build a descent life for yourself and your children - It's relentless and wrong and I hate it!

People should know, a lack of motivation to work is not necessarily a sign of laziness. The fact is, no-one really wants to do the jobs that are on offer because they are exploitative. People  are treated like spongers, not because they don't wanna work, but because they understanably don't want to be exploited. It's not the work in itself, it's the abusive nature of the work. Pressure to work through breaks, eyes on you all the time, worked like a dog for a pittance, basically, people are treated like crap. Why should anyone have to put up with it!

All this is bad enough, and although few may be able to get out of the poverty trap and exploitation, for most on estates, perhaps for you, life is marked by a big STRUGGLE on every front.

Raising children with no money - struggle.

Work - struggle

Paying bills - struggle

Poor food and clothes budget - struggle

Doing the shopping - struggle

Juggling work and child care - struggle

Unemployed? - struggle

Getting rubbish to the tip - struggle without a car

Running a car - struggle!

All this struggle is a result of sin. It ravages lives. Much of it is the sin of the selfish rich in exploiting the poor. 

Another Way

But this world we live in is not all there is! There is another community you can be part of, another 'Kingdom' that Jesus is establishing. You can be part of that. And as I once read somewhere, His Kingdom is not just pie in the sky when you die, but meat on your plate while you wait! Jesus' Kingdom is not just a promise for the future, but He makes a substantial difference now too.

Jesus alternative Kingdom began 2000 years ago, you can become part of it now. It is a kingdom of righteousness and justice, goodness, fairness, hope and grace. Most of all, entering that Kingdom means all your own guilt gets dealt with.

Yes, you are a victim of the system and you have been sinned against. But the truth is, you are not just a victim, others have been your victim. You have also 'sinned', think of all the people you have hurt in life - that's sin and you, like me and everyone else, need a new, fresh start, free of guilt. You may not feel like that but one day you will know it's true - because we will all give an account to God.

On that day, it would be the worst of tragedies if you - having been exploited by the rich in this life, then find you are shut out from God's kingdom for eternity because you never dealt with your own sin in this life.

That is why I live here in Moulsecoomb. I want the exploited of this world to at least know the hope, joy and promise of God's coming Kingdom and to begin entering now. No matter what your situation, and despite your very real STRUGGLE, you can know genuine peace, hope, strength, stability, purpose and meaning, forgiveness and freedom from guilt. These are what the Christian faith offer. Don't dismiss it out of hand. If you wanna know more - ask me! jrebera.nlc@gmail.com or 07534987583

Boko Haram chants "Allahu Akbar" [God is great], a Christian response

Rather than follow on from my last post, I felt I should comment on Boko Haram. This is a long post, but it is a big subject.

I am quite public about my faith in God. So it surprises me that people don't ask and challenge me ... "Julian, where is your God?" I wish they would ask me. Atrocities such as Boko Haram's should cause people to ask questions of people like me. Perhaps people are too polite so I thought I'd answer the questions anyway.

Boko Haram (BH) is a fundamental islamist group operating lout of North East Nigeria. BH has recently emerged from obscurity to become an international household name. Not fame but infamy. Their crime, the kidnapping of girls from a school in Nigeria three weeks ago.

Less known is the fact that, just last Monday BH unleashed hell on a busy market in North East Nigeria, indiscriminately spraying bullets in all directions. Those not killed ran for cover by locking themselves in shops. BH's response? Burn the shops! The death toll is at 310 civillians shot or burned to death.

During the massacre the BH shouted and chanted the words "Allahu Akbar" which means  "God is great".

This massacre, like the recent abduction was in God's name. 

As Christians we maintain that God is essentially Love, and is all powerful, All wise, All seeing, Sovereign (meaning nothing at all, past, present and future is hidden from Him. Nothing can surprise Him or scupper His plans, nothing is outside of His control). 

So how can an all powerful God of love sit back idly in heaven, watching BH commit his atrocities in God's name? How can God see where these poor girls are being held, yet do nothing? What kind of a God is He? Surely the fact that this happened proves that either there is no God, or if there is he doesn't care, or if he does he isn't powerful and so can't help. My answer to that is, such a God would be useless and not worth spitting on.

BH is right about one thing, God is Great, but BH knows nothing of God.

God is great, He is Love, all power belongs to Him. God can totally obliterate Boko Haram and set free those girls. God could easily have intervened and prevented BH slaughtering 310 on Monday. 

So why hasn't God intervened? Why doesn't He intervene? These are the questions I want to answer.

1) GOD IS GREAT! My starting point is to underline what the Bible teaches. God is Great! All powerful, All seeing, All wise, unstoppable, indestructible, pure, righteous and good in every conceivable way.

2) SOMETHING IS WRONG: BH and their atrocities (and a million other examples can be given) show us our world is seriously, very, very seriously corrupt, screwed up and that SOMETHING IS VERY WRONG.

3) NO-ONE CAN FIX IT. Even if those girls are all rescued unharmed, and I pray they are, they have been seriously traumatised. They are already damaged. Insecurity has already devastated their lives. They may learn to live again but damage has been done and nothing can undo it. This world is full of the walking wounded. Full of devastated lives.

4) IT WILL NOT STOP. Even if BH is stamped out, and I pray it is, others will rise up in their place. Apart from that, a million other permeations of total evil are rife from the trafficking of little girls and boys as sex slaves to so-called legitimate wars and regime change with the terrible wickedness and suffering that all brings.

Why then does God allow it?

God allows it because we, you and I, all of us, that is this world, have, on the whole chosen to reject God. That is the truth.  We reject God as God but we would have Him as our Servant. Those are our terms. We all would like a God more like a Genie, who will grant unlimited wishes. We do not want a God who rules over us. We want to rule our own lives, our own families, our own destinies. True? Therefore we reject God.

God, in all His love wants to be in relationship with us, he wants to rule over our lives and this world because He loves us and because He can make all things good. But He will not force himself on the world or anyone in it. He accepts our choice to live without Him.

The story of the Prodigal Son in the Bible is helpful. (Click this link to read it) in this story the son takes his inheritance from his father, blows it, gets into severe trouble and hardship, then comes to his senses and returns to his father.

God wants us to come to our senses. He wants us to realise we cannot rule the world without Him without severe consequences for humanity. Of course, God could intervene whenever bad stuff is going to happen. We would love that. We would live our godless lives, getting all the benefits of God whilst rejecting Him. We would happily use God when we want him and discard Him like a worthless piece of rubbish when we're done with Him, until of course we want Him again. 

If God did stuff on our terms He would cease to be God. He would be pathetic. But God is Great! And He will not compromise His greatness.

So he does grant mankind's main wish, that we be in charge of this world. This is the world you and I have chosen. A godless world full of godless people living godless lives doing godless things, sometimes, like BH, in the name of God.

Most of us would have God intervene, deal with BH and then He can "piss off" again so that we can do whatever we want.

My question is this. How bad, evil, wicked and cruel do things have to get before the world turns to Jesus? How bad has it got to get before the world realises it is in desperate need of God? I think the answer is this: The world, as a whole will never turn back to God. As long as the majority have enough of what they want out of this life - the world will not turn to God - despite the fact our neighbours pay a terrible price of suffering - as long as it's not me. That is the problem, we are all very selfish. The Bible calls this SIN.


Apart from the wickedness of mankind, there are other powerful spiritual forces of evil at work too - demonic spirits.

I realise this sounds ridiculous. But there are such spirit creatures, limited in number, invisible, but their effects are clearly visible. Boko Haram, far from representing God is doubtless demonically driven. Ordinary people don't do the stuff they are doing. There is an evil force behind them and they don't even know it. It is the same evil force at work in men who abuse children, it is the same demonic evil influence that fills people to want to eat other people, torture them and be unspeakably wicked.

We have rejected God and so live in a world at the mercy of demonic spirits at work in both our world system and in individuals, and we are at the mercy of basically selfish people - that's all of us.

SO WHAT THEN? But this is God's world. He created it and He will not allow it to go on forever as it is. He has set a time when He will return and put an end to all evil and suffering and will establish His Kingdom over which He Himself will rule with love and Justic forever. He will rid the world or all evil once for all.

WHAT HAS GOD DONE? When we see the evil in the world we respond by posting protest posters on Face Book, perhaps you send the odd £20 to alleviate suffering, maybe you give £2 per month to sponsor a child in poverty. While we respond in our way, we wonder, "Why doesn't this so-called God do something?". But He has. When God saw the human misery that exists as a result of our SIN and evil, He sent His Son into the world, to demonstrate the goodness of God and His power and His Kingdom, and then to take upon Himself all our SIN, to pay the price for it so that we can know full healing, full forgiveness, and be united with God.

WHAT IS GOD DOING RIGHT NOW? Right now God is recruiting people into His Kingdom. Through the message of the gospel we get to come back to God, be totally forgiven so that in this world we can begin to live under His rule. Then when He returns, we will have a place in His new world.

All who continue to reject, will continue to get what they want - a world without God - but then (when He returns) it will not be this world. God will have taken back everything that is His, that is everything that is good. What will be left, Bible calls hell. Hell is the inheritance of all who reject God because Hell is all there is without Him.

If God intervenes now, the question is, are you in His Kingdom, or outside of it?

Wanna know more, message any questions.

What is truly worth dying for?

A great Christian man called DL Moody reportedly said, "If you have nothing worth dying for, then you have nothing worth living for". Actually, that makes a lot of sense. Surely we all want things in life that are so good, so precious they are worth dying for. Those are things really worth living for.

We humans, despite being wonderfully endowed with massive brain power and ability to think carefully in a way unmatched by any other creature known to us in the universe, too often act and even think instinctively as though we are just like all the lower animals not having the power of thought we posses.

So, most commonly we answer DL Moody's words instinctively (not thoughtfully) by saying things like, "my children are what is most precious, they are worth dying for so they are worth living for".

There is no doubt that all human life is precious, and it is natural and right to feel strongly about our children. But that is an animalistic response, it is instinctive and emotional, and very powerful. But it does not use our highest faculty - thought.

What if we think about it rather than react instinctively? Then I think rational reasoning would go like this...

D L Moody "If you've got nothing worth dying for then you've got nothing worth living for"

Us "I do have something worth dying for, that is my children, so I do have something worth living for, that is, my children".

D L Moody "What's so great about your children that their lives are of more value than yours? If your child goes on to find the cure for Malaria or cancer, or if your child is going to end wars, or if your child is going to eradicate pornography and human trafficking, yeah, that is a really important and significant life worth dying for. But if your child is going to be mostly selfish, bum around, be a bit of a bully, spend his best time playing X Box, perhaps doing an ordinary job that earns his living, is that really a life worth dying for? 

If we say our children are worth dying for and so worth living for, then, rationally speaking, either we place a huge burden upon them to do something great with their lives, or if they live trivial lives, we have wasted and trivialised our own precious lives living for their trivial lives.

As much as I love my wife and four beautiful daughters, I am not persuaded that they are living lives that are particularly better than anyone else's, and neither do I want to shoulder them with a burden of feeling they must achieve greatness. But neither do I want to trivialise my own precious life.

There has got to be a 'reason' for living. A rational purpose that makes life worthwhile. And it has got to be more than just my children. After all, they will probably live for their children, who will live for their children, and so on until humanity and eventually all life dies out. Then what? Then it will be that we all lived for something that came to nothing.

A great man in the Bible reflected on this and wrote ...

"Man who is born of a woman, flowers and then fads away, like a shadow that flees at the sunset, in a lifetime that's just like a day". (Job)

And Shakespeare sums up most of our lives well, 

"Life's but a walking shadow, a poor player that struts and frets his hour upon the stage, and then is heard no more; it is a tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing"

In other words, ultimately, life is absurd and meaningless. There's surely more to life than this!

In my next blog I will explain how Jesus rationally, emotionally, mentally and spiritually can give ultimate meaning to all our lives.