25th – 28th Feb 2010
(click map to enlarge) Walking inside the outline of what has been the ‘Bell’ walk has a completely different feel to it. Hidden inside in a cast iron mould where the sound is a bit muffled has a different dynamic! The flow of this walk is the ‘River of Life’. Three of us set out last Thursday, joining me was Phil from Leeds, Sue from Chichester but Sarah from St Albans was taken out last minute by a violent stomach bug. Us ladies were struggling with a sprained ankle and tendonitus so with Sarah waylaid it was a wonder we got out the door! ….Phil is the saving grace! With such a whittled down team I was not sure how this walk was going to reach its destination but did not feel that the timing was wrong. If Lincoln is the head and the coast is the feet, St Albans is the gut and we were certainly manifesting what was in the land.
Everytime it seems like these walks come to ‘fetch’ us before we even set out and there is a journey to be taken beforehand which is not pleasant but very much part of readiness for the walk and our positioning. So in faith I put my foot across my front door step to arrive in St Albans in 4 days time. It began to rain and decided not to stop all day, we walked with continual streams running past us, negotiated flooded roads and got drenched. Walking for the ‘River of Life’ flow was all round us and the crazy joy that came with it was such fun. We were mad people who could hardly put one foot infront of t’other, soaked to the skin and at the same time hoping we were making difference….we could not help but burst out laughing at ourselves! All we know is we are seeking to align with heaven and this is Gods deal. For me this is what this walk is about, leaning right into Jesus because I cannot do it and He has already done it.
Day 2: Hindhead…a bottle neck, a place where 3 counties converge on a cemetery and a railway bridge. We hit this seen/unseen ‘cork’ and Phil ended up buffeted 4 miles off course and confused. This was hard for such a small team but Jesus always has a way and bigger fish to fry. So Phil hit Hindhead and simultaneously that night his wife dreamt of a connection; a childhood trauma that had affected Phil’s brain stem ever since and caused the suffering of severe insomnia in his adult life. So we prayed for the ‘hind’ of Phil’s head and called for a new way to be opened up for him….and that it will be so in that bit of the land as well.
Maidenhead is where Annie and Julian Bullen live, Annie was the original connection as to why Maidenhead is on my map. As we walked through there last October the Bullens were in Mozambique for a years commitment to live among the Koti people and be a support where there are so few resources. This time round they are home and we were able to stay with them which was so good, big thanks!
I love it when I trip over another bit of God’s jigsaw that is so multi-dimensional I get a headache just seeing few pieces! I have been aware that Maidenhead is on the doorstep of my family ancestral home that embodied control, empire and abuse of governance in the land. My link with Lincoln and Anglesey have the same family connection which God is using and unravelling in a very hidden way to restore order on a larger scale. In Anglesey, my friends lived on a road called by my family’s name and Annie Bullen grew up on the road named after my family’s home. As Annie and I reached the Bell pub in the centre of Maidenhead, church bells began to ring which is becoming a constant sign on these walks. Then we headed out of the town past my ancestral home on our left, and past a masonic link to that home on our right very concious that we walked through the centre of these two places. At this point we directly headed towards a village with the same name as my eldest son, ‘Jordan’. So we literally pulled away from ancestral bondage and the masonic holds, leaving them behind and called for our sons and the next generation to come into full inheritance.
Dave and Sue Erasmus joined us from Cobham as we walked towards St Albans and at last, Sarah was able to join us on the last day. Just three of us had begun the walk to St Albans and now three of us were to complete it, Sarah, Annie and myself. We encountered so many obstacles it was a bit like jumping hurdles at the end a long run. Walking in I could really feel the canopy/cover on Lincoln north of us and as we went up Holywell hill where Alban’s head is said have tumbled down we approached ‘our spot’. On the street between Lambs Alley and a boarded up pub called the Bell we had stood with white roses and prayed last May. As we arrived I spied some scaffolding and having dared to hope it might be the case….. it was…the Bell pub was being restored for opening…love it! In such a downpour of God’s presence I could have stayed there for hours but there was one more job to do.
Between the clocktower and the Cathedral was a ‘Eleanor’s Cross’ placed there by Edward I, this is one of 12 crosses erected between Lincoln and London as Edward carried his dead wife’s body home. I met the first of these at Waltham Cross while walking the river Lea with Paul Wood and felt strangely moved although I did not know anything about them. I have felt they are part of this journey somehow, so I have committed to visit the location of each cross and ‘bag’ it for Jesus. This is the first of the 12 crosses and I do believe I have been given a large ‘bag’ to put them in, a bit like Mary Poppin’s carpet bag where all sorts of rather large objects can be placed!! These crosses represent a royal marriage that was unusually faithful and based on love and so now they will become pinpoints of the love of the bridegroom for His bride. The red dots on the map are where the crosses were or are. All belongs to Jesus however thwarted or deformed, all comes from Him and will return to Him. The pretender can only twist but cannot create, nothing belongs to the imposter and with this in mind we spoke to the ‘Isis healing center’ next to the ‘cross’ place and told it to move on out because we are calling for a place of intimacy with Jesus here in the crossover place between Lincoln and Brighton.
Big thanks to the team, to Malc back at home, to lovely John and Ruth Cumming for hosting us in Chichester, to Sally Ann for helping me see the ‘crosses’, to the amazing prayer cover around the nation and to all who bump into a ‘Hindhead’ and find a new way through.