Cor Deo

A copy of a piece for our Church Magazine.

            The 20^th June 2013, my last day of Cor Deo, was one of mixed emotions.  Having spent the last 20 weeks with 8 other keen Christian men, living, working and playing together brought us all very close to each other.  We could share our hearts with each other, our disappointments and joys.  I have never had such a close relationship with any other Christian man.  It seemed strange as we said our goodbyes, knowing that the following week, we would not be meeting up again.

             Looking back over the 20 weeks, how can I sum up the experience.  One of the key aspects of Cor Deo which had attracted me was their stated aim that they exist to multiply believers “after God’s own heart."  Jon had been on the course the year before and had found it helpful, and I had always wanted to have this kind of mentoring experience.

           My longing and struggle has always been to have a deeper relationship with the Lord, and I felt that this time would be a help to me as I transitioned back into life in the UK.

I wasn’t sure how Peter and Ron would react to my desire to join them for this year’s course.  However, they were very gracious about it, and so I turned up at Ladyfield church in Chippenham for 9:15 a.m. on the 19^th January, not quite sure what to expect.  There were 8 of us ‘students’, Peter Mead, and Ron Frost, as well as David Searight who had just arrived from the USA as a mentor trainee.  The 8 of us were from a wide background of experiences and ages.  One had given up his job to attend, several others were in between jobs, one was a church pastor, and one was looking for further training prior to returning to Italy to begin a church plant in Naples.  It wasn’t long before we were beginning to know each other and by the end of the 20 weeks, we were all very close.

What did the programme each week consist of?  We met Tuesdays to Thursdays.  We started the week sharing our experiences of what God had done through us, or things we had been involved in over the weekend.  Also prayer requests were shared and we then had a time of prayer.  We then did an over view

of the whole Bible, on Wednesday mornings we had in depth studies in Johns Gospel and Hebrews when we used sheets with the passage on to mark up to aid us in noticing what the passage was saying.  On Thursday mornings we looked at Church history as a way to understand how our theology was influenced and developed, and how this affected the Reformers and Puritans.  We looked at different theological streams, and how each affects our responses and behaviour.  We were also encouraged to do Bible ‘read throughs’, which we did with a partner.  The purpose of this was to allow God to speak to our hearts as we read chunks of His word at a time.  Just about all of us had done at least one read through of the Bible by the end of the 20 weeks.  In fact it was interesting to hear one week how one of our team had got together with a number of others one Saturday and read through the whole New Testament in one day, reading a chapter each in turn from first thing in the morning until late at night!  If God has given us His word why don’t we read all of it and hear Him speak to us through it?  We also had a project to work on throughout the weeks, and on a Thursday afternoon we had mentoring time when we discussed our projects.  This was a most valuable time and was very instructional.  I learnt a lot through this process of discussing the project.  We also had  two book reviews to give, and both my books were helpful and challenging. 

So what next?  One thing that can benefit all of us, is to do a ‘read through’ with a partner.  We don’t need to go to Cor Deo to do that.  It involves reading through the Bible and underlining verses that speak to you, or strike you as being meaningful and helpful.  Then once a week, meet up for an agreed time.  Begin by sharing how the week has gone, and then take about 10 minutes each and share the verses with each other without comment or explanation.  You may find that 10 minutes is not long enough to cover all your verses, but that is ok.  Just share what you can in 10 minutes.  Afterwards, if you want to share something from your ‘read through’, that’s ok too, but not essential.  Then close the time with prayer.  If anyone would like to do a ‘read through’, I am looking for a ‘read through’ partner, so please let me know if you are interested.

I can thoroughly recommend that the time spent doing a Cor Deo course will not be wasted.  If you want an appetiser they do offer one week intensives at various times throughout the year.  Ladies are welcome at this time too.  If your are interested, the website is: http://www.cordeo.org.uk/.